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From David in Israel: Off Grid Alternatives to Utility-Supplied Electricity
James
One of the most troubling things I see when speaking to people about going off grid is how badly they want to keep all of their electrical appliances and just spend many thousands of dollars on a battery bank more appropriate for a U-boat and solar cells or generators to keep them topped off. Having had a minor role in a micro-satellite system design proposal one thing you learn when confronted by limited power supply is to either economize or do without.
The appliances you own for on grid use are not efficient. They are built to be inexpensive or if you are better off durable, even the fancy electrical appliances out of Europe with the Energy Star are in reality a big waste of power once you are paying by the off grid watt for solar panels and battery banks. There is no reason a normal family shouldn't consider an off grid option for their home. Even in a national emergency and societal breakdown it is very rare for supplies of diesel fuel, gasoline, kerosene, and LP gas to be unavailable for long periods at some price.
Dryer - Enemy number one especially in a large family, a solar clothes dryer is under $5 at nearly every hardware store, ask for a clothesline. Folding indoor drying racks are very popular in Israel. Even in winter indoor drying can be assisted by using a fan, it will also keep the air humidified. After trying the above and finding you just can't make it there are LP gas heated clothes dryers, but these still need mains power for the drum motor.
Oven/Stovetop - There is no reason to use electrical power for cooking. Excellent caterer grade ovens and stoves are available at most appliance stores which run totally on gas. Some may use an electrical ignition or thermostat but nearly all can be retrofitted either with a piezoelectric (no battery needed) spark starter or can just be lit with a match avoiding the danger of the old style pilot light since they now are equipped with a thermal safety. Most people find they actually prefer gas once they are used to it as it is a more even heat. We have had good success using MSR camping kerosene burners when the gas to our home was unavailable for a few weeks.
Hot Water - Nearly any off grid home will benefit from the addition of a solar collector in addition to a well-insulated gas water heater. Think about turning down the thermostat or using a secondary gas instant heating system and low flow shower heads to stretch your hot water supply.
Heating - Most stores and contractors can provide a wide variety of wood, pellet, gas, kerosene, or oil-fueled stoves and furnaces and space heaters. Insulation is key to keeping your alternative heat system from breaking your bank account.
Power Tools - Some older large shop tools can be powered by a PTO shaft or belt system. The possibilities from a gas motor, to steam, to hydro and beyond are limited only by your imagination.
Water pressure - In many areas there is not enough wind for a windmill to keep a water tower full so an electrical or gas pump might work better once all factors are evaluated. If your retreat is located below the summit of the hill it would probably be much easier to install a pool or cistern on the summit to provide pressure for firefighting operations even if your pump is destroyed, for every 10 feet of elevation 10PSI of water pressure is required for filling your tower or cistern and this pressure is returned when water is used in your home or property. Anyone living in a wilderness area should have in addition to a gravity fed water system of at least 1,500 gallons and a 300 gpm capacity, and at least one portable reservoir. There are portable swimming pools that are the same as US Forest Service uses for firefighting, and a gas powered portable pump for emergency firefighting. Descending water can be run reverse through some pumps generating electricity making it a very effective and inexpensive way to store electrical power once your battery banks are full.
Refrigeration - Most readers if their inventory their refrigerator will find mostly leftovers or things which actually will last until consumption without refrigeration. There are high quality kerosene and LP gas powered absorption refrigerators, some with secondary mains power optional, available from a few suppliers even in the US.
For those with the skills required to build and test a system which can withstand 250 psi anhydrous ammonia, copying the old Crosley Icy-Ball chest refrigerator-freezer is a thrifty option. Since anti-drug manufacturing laws make obtaining anhydrous ammonia difficult, an icy-ball can be built with drains on the absorptive water side to self distill ammonia from cleaning solution. A warning: Ammonia is a dangerous respiratory irritant and any homemade system should be used with caution and kept and recharged outside in case of leakage. One DIY design includes a shutoff valve to keep the ammonia from reabsorbing until the valve is opened allowing it to be stored in a charged condition.
Before refrigeration people would buy eggs and milk fresh in the city or if they could have chickens and a cow or goat would produce their own. A chicken is easily consumed by even a small family once cooked, in less than a day.
A water evaporation cooler cabinet is another very cheap option for keeping food.
Lighting - Gas mantle lighting once found in most urban homes is not difficult to implement using either camping lamps and piped gas or better yet certified indoor lamps. While in college I worked in a gun and camping shop which sold a reverse fitting for refilling disposable Coleman LP gas cartridges from the older non-tip over shutoff bulk tanks making camp lights highly practical for hanging. It must be remembered that gas lighting presents an increased fire hazard so precautions including avoiding clutter and considering the floor and wall surface must be taken into account. Battery powered florescent and LED lights and LED nightlights are also useful for reading and small tinkering. Metal halide lighting is much more power friendly than incandescent if large areas require illumination for security purposes.
Communications - Your radio communications system should have a redundant battery bank and power supply should your services be required in an emergency. It should be remembered the operating rule of just as much power as required and the usage of low power consumption modes like CW. Tube systems are notoriously wasteful of power and tubes have limited life so these should be kept as backup systems in most cases. Only power up satellite Internet systems after you have typed up all the e-mails and set them up to send immediately after going online. There are offline viewers which will call up all the web sites you normally visit and grab them all for later viewing.
Television sets, satellite receivers, and large stereo systems are wasteful of electrical power if left on. A small notebook computer for occasional movies and an MP3 player for music will save many valuable watts. Unplug or employ a disconnect switch [or power strip with switch] on all electronics unless they are in use. This will protect them from power surges in addition to eliminating sleep-state power draw. [Also know as a "phantom load."]
Telephone - If your retreat can obtain telephone service a secondary redundant system connecting you to selected neighbors can be set up in some areas by ordering an old style alarm or bell line to one central home, this is usually cheaper than a line with actual telephone service, and should work in most telephone systems even if the central office with its redundant power goes offline but the wires are still intact. The Telephone company will either splice the wire pairs at the neighborhood box or at the closest central office, officially only for alarm systems, it is possible to set up anything from long run Ethernet or simple voice lines with an old style "everybody rings" party line. This will not save off grid watts but is a good way to add redundancy to your retreat.
Safety - Install at least two combo carbon monoxide sensing smoke alarms in your home in addition to a smoke alarm in every occupied room. In these alarms, install long life lithium batteries and check on the first of the month and every time you change to or from daylight savings. DO NOT use rechargeable batteries for your smoke and carbon monoxide alarms!
Due to the higher fire risk using flame-based alternatives to electricity I even more strongly recommend installation of fire sprinklers in all rooms, flame hoods over all cooking surfaces with automatic sprinklers that have a manual activation, and at least two standpipe and hose cabinets with 100 gpm gravity flow minimum per standpipe, ABC-rated fire extinguisher, gloves, goggles, and Nomex face shroud. Install outdoor standpipes and stocked hose locker for wildfires, a charged mobile phone for 911 (BTW, you need not have an active calling plan to use a cell phone to call 911 in the USA) and if you have to retreat from interior firefighting. Most importantly have an evacuation and rendezvous family accounting plan and volunteer with the local volunteer fire department, learn when the fire is just too big to fight by yourself.
With an engineering eye it is often possible to reduce your home or retreat electrical requirements to an inexpensive few hundred watts once alternatives are considered. Shalom, - David in Israel
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Gear Up -- Appropriate and Redundant Technologies for Prepared Families
I frequently stress the importance of well-balanced preparedness in my writings. All too often, I've seen people that go to extremes, to the point that these extremes actually detract from the ability to survive a disaster situation. These range from the "all the gear that I'll need to survive is in my backpack" mentality to the "a truckload of this or that" fixation. But genuine preparedness lies in comprehensive planning, strict budgeting, and moderation. Blowing your entire preparedness budget on just one category of gear is detrimental to your overall preparedness.
Another common mistake that I see among my consulting clients is an over-emphasis on either very old technologies or on the "latest and greatest" technologies. In the real world, preparedness necessitates having a bit of both. At the Rawles Ranch we have both 19th century technology (like hand-powered tools) and a few of the latest technologies like passive IR intrusion detection (Dakota Alerts), photovoltaics, and electronic night vision. My approach is to pick and choose the most appropriate technologies that I can maintain by myself, but to always have backups in the form of less exotic or earlier, albeit less-efficient technologies. For example, my main shortwave receiver is a Sony ICF-SW7600GR. But in the event of EMP, I also a have a pair of very inexpensive Kaito shortwaves and a trusty old Zenith Trans-Oceanic radio that uses vacuum tubes. Like my other spare electronics, these are all stored in a grounded galvanized steel can when not in use.
Here is my approach to preparedness gear, in a nutshell
- Redundancy, squared. I jokingly call my basement Jim's Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR)
- Buy durable gear. Think of it as investing for your children and grandchildren. And keep in mind that there'll be no more "quick trips to the hardware store" after TSHTF.
- Vigilantly watch Craigslist, Freecycle, classified ads, and eBay for gear at bargain prices.
- Strive for balanced preparedness that "covers all bases"--all scenarios.
- Flexibility and Adaptability (Examples: shop to match a 12 VDC standard for most small electronics, truly multi-purpose equipment, multi-ball hitches, NATO slave cable connectors for 24 VDC vehicles, Anderson Power Pole connectors for small electronics--again, 12 VDC)
- Retain the ability to revert to older, more labor-intensive technology.
- Fuel flexibility (For example: Flex fuel vehicles (FFVs), Tri-fuel generators
, and biodiesel compatible vehicles)
- Purchase high-quality used (but not abused) gear, preferably when bargains can be found
- If in doubt, then buy mil-spec.
- If in doubt, then buy the larger size and the heavier thickness.
- If in doubt, then buy two. (Our motto: "Two is one and one is none.")
- Buy systematically, and only as your budget allows. (Avoid debt!)
- Invest your sweat equity. Not only will you save money, but you also will learn more valuable skills.
- Train with what you have, and learn from the experts. Tools without training are almost useless.
- Learn to maintain and repair your gear. (Always buy spare parts and full service manuals!)
- Buy guns in common calibers
- Buy with long service life in mind (such as low self-discharge NiMH rechargeable batteries.)
- Store extra for charity and barter
- Grow your own and buy the tooling to make your own--don't just store things.
- Rust is the enemy, and lubrication
and spot painting
are your allies.
- Avoid being an "early adopter" of new technology--or you'll pay more and get lower reliability.
- Select all of your gear with your local climate conditions in mind.
- Recognize that there are no "style" points in survival. Don't worry about appearances--concentrate on practicality and durability.
- As my old friend "Doug Carlton" is fond of saying: "Just cut to size, file to fit,, and paint to match."
- Don't skimp on tools. Buy quality tools (such as Snap-on and Craftsman brands), but buy them used, to save money.
- Skills beat gadgets and practicality beats style.
- Use group standardization for weapons and electronics. Strive for commonality of magazines, accessories and spare parts
- Gear up to raise livestock. It is an investment that breeds.
- Build your fences bull strong and sheep tight.
- Tools without the appropriate safety gear (like safety goggles, helmets, and chainsaw chaps
) are just accidents waiting for a place to happen.
- Whenever you have the option, buy things in flat, earth tone colors
- Plan ahead for things breaking or wearing out.
- Always have a Plan B and a Plan C
If you are serious about preparedness, then I recommend that you take a similar approach.
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Letter Re: Some Technologies for Retreat Security
Jim
I've put together a few ideas on retreat security that I haven't seen on your
great site. I may have missed them but I think they would bear repeating.
I presently
live near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but will soon be moving to my 280 acre
ranch in central Nevada.
What got me to write this was a realization during my semiannual chore of
servicing the
emergency
generator.
Changing out the gas (It is also set up to run it on propane) changing the
oil, and testing the circuitry, I realized that what I thought was a good
setup
was
actually lacking.
I have always made the preparedness of our home priority. If a storm knocks
out the power, I go start the generator and switch the control box. My "Ah-ha"
moment came with the realization that if the power were ever cut intentionally,
all security would be off until after I'd expose myself to go start the generator.
Needless to say
corrective
action projects (remote start, auto control panels, and UPS battery
backup for the security system) are now underway.
Education has been mentioned but I realized that I hadn't seen much about
basic electronics. Learning how to make small circuit boards is really rather
simple,
and allows
you to make a lot of toys (equipment) for the homestead. A simple IR detection
circuit to let you know if someone is coming in under cover of night. A display
can show which sensors are being activated. This way you have a choice, whether
or not to let someone know you are alert
to their presence. Pressure [sensing] pads you can make yourself to show if
someone is standing behind that large boulder, by the barn, or shed. [JWR
Adds: Commercially-made
pressure sensing pads are far more reliable weather-resistant. Used ones are
sometimes sold as surplus by alarm companies.] How about a simple circuit that
is connected
to motion/heat sensors in the house
that
light
an
LED array that not only shows someone is in your house but on which
floor or in which room. There are electronics parts vendor sites like Jameco and
DigiKey and web sites
like Instructables.com, Makezine and
similar hobby and hacking sites that show all sorts of projects and skills.
When I
get my
next batch of wire I am setting small speakers to exploit a bit of human nature
by creating a brief sound to get intruders to look in a particular direction
and then two seconds later turn on concealed 500 Watt floodlights for a blinding
effect.
These floodlights will
be good
for
general
use as well. I mentioned pressure pads for detection earlier. One of the ideas
at the ranch was to place large cover objects at strategic points to funnel
a potential intruder to a place he could hide and I could remote view the opposition
at the same time. Mini cams and mikes and alarm pressure pads will give you
a heads up.
Since my ranch a long way from law enforcement protection, a remote
defense is also installed. Behind two of the boulders I had moved with the
rented dozer, I placed a small outcropping of rock in the ground so as to leave
nothing to hide behind but left a cavity in front to set plastic bagged SKS rifles
(sans stocks) [in mounting frames with solenoid-actuated triggers and] cameras
at the scope (which by the way is a great way to aim around corners) and the
aiming
is
done
by
remote
control
units
from
the hobby shop (or eBay). Solar power and small batteries keep things operational.
(I am sure the liabilities and legalities will be questioned, so let's say
the property is set up for installation after TSHTF).
Safety is important so the units are double switched, one to turn on the power
and
the
other to
control
and fire. The third unit is similar but I made a small bracket on the tree
behind the third cover position, laid in my controls, made a cloth skirt at
the base to allow movement and then used the foam
insulation in a spray can and made a foam cover to look like a branch
and spray painted with a couple of
colors
. This made it so invisible that a visiting friend couldn't detect it even
after I told him where it was. The cost for cameras, microphones, controllers,
and sensors
is really
small--from
under $2 for sensors to perhaps $25 for the others. What you pay big bucks
for is the labor and knowledge. But you you get that by turning off the television
and
exercising your brain.
[JWR Adds: Consult your state and local laws on "trap
guns" before
considering any such installation. Also keep in mind that any semi-auto firearm
that is triggered via solenoid might be construed to be a " machinegun" if
there is any way whatsoever that more than one cartridge could be fired by
a single press of the remote "trigger". Also, keep in mind that in
the US, Federal law that restricts not only barrel length but also overall
length for a firearm.
(Rifles
and shotguns must have a minimum overall length of 26 inches.) Multiply-redundant
safeties should be designed, as a well as a safe backstop for any bullets fired.
In
my opinion,
installation
of a remotely-fired gun should only be considered in absolute "worst
case" situations.
Their use in any lesser situation might very well land your in court, on trial
either criminally and/or civilly, in a very bad light that would doubtless
be exploited by
hostile attorneys.]
Before I leave this topic I would add that on the previous
mentioned
web sites and YouTube.com and Google video you can learn how to pick locks,
scavenge old camera parts, make and run a forge, start fires, throw flame,
make thermite, generate smoke and just about anything else you can think of.
Its like having a couple hundred mischievous people in your R&D department.
How about remote cameras? There are gadget sites, military and defense corporations,
and especially university sites have many ideas, for free, such as GizMag,
DARPA, and MIT.
One topic of interest is remote viewing. You can launch a hand held and nearly
silent electronic plane
and
view all points of
the ranch in very short amount of time without exposing yourself. It could
also be used to find wild game. [This is called "First
Person View (FPV) piloting.] Try
a web search on "remote FPV flying" and watch a couple of videos. The aforementioned
hobby
web sites
are
also a
resource
on
model aircraft information. [JWR Adds: Radio control aircraft
servos have numerous uses for folks with creative minds.] Prices range from
$300-to-$400 to as much
as $1,500 This can be applied to rc cars
adding
remote
microphone
and
speaker,
and
rc
helicopters
as well.
It
only took a couple of hours to get a real good feel for it,. But I should add
that I haven't yet flown it in high wind.
To set up [for security at] the ranch property I mapped out GPS way
points and used a range finder for all the prominent features. I would also
suggest
a
picture
of
the property
and the surrounding properties from Google maps . At several strategic spots
I planted some damaged concrete sewer pipes on end--I had obtained these
free for the asking--and made large lids for them with a plastic base and the
aforementioned spray
can foam to look like the landscape, with a hollow center so you could look
out small holes without moving the lid. Inside is water and there are a couple
of ammo cans for food, and
a small seat
and space blanket, iron oxide hand warmers which are also good for emergency
in your car and coat pocket or keeping vigil at a remote hide--[a small heat
source] can be the difference between bearable, frostbitten, or dead. I've
requested more
of the free concrete pipes be saved so that I can bury them between the house
and the barn and run a little shuttle
between the two buildings. Why not,? The price is right.
For structure fire suppression and prevention, I'll just mention these two
products as a one-time fire insurance policy: ThemoGel and
Barricade. Perhaps
at some point this could also be made a remotely-triggered function. I hope
you find some of this useful. - Erik
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Letter Re: A Recent Fire Evacuation Experience
James:
Last weekend my town was threatened by a pretty big fire. Dozens of homes
burned, thousands of citizens were evacuated. My neighborhood was among those
ordered to flee the advancing flames. (Drama!)
My family was prepared to leave ahead of time and evacuated safely in large
part because of the advice and encouragement I have found at SurvivalBlog.
Thank you.
I did learn a few things. Theory flies out the window when panic is in the
air. What is organized and prepared ahead of time actually works, what is thrown
together at the last minute tends to fall apart. I had my Bug Out Vehicle (B.O.V.)
fueled and standing by the night before but many did not and I saw long lines
at every
gas station as people were struggling to flee. The major exits were all jammed
with vehicles and as tensions rose, tempers flared. Several collisions were
reported, slowing down the evacuation further. People generally remained orderly,
but my spouse reports that as fire trucks and other emergency responders were
making their way via siren through the crowded roads, opportunistic tailgaters
would follow them. I saw none of it, as I took the less known and less traveled
back woods roads out of town.
I hauled all the usual checklist items; important
documents, tangible savings, family photo albums, firearms and ammunition,
fuel, genset,
med kit, food and water supplies, camping gear, etc. With all normal routes
into and out of town barricaded we had no idea when we would
be allowed back in or what we would find when we got there.
Communications broke down when concerned calls flooded in. The local paper
did a bang-up job of keeping us informed using Google Maps, but when the power
lines burned it was tough to get on the Internet. Voice Over Internet Protocol
(VOIP) phone lines tied to cable service fail when the cable service substation
is
dependant
on
local
power. We are considering putting in a backup "Plain Old Telephone Service" (POTS) line for
emergency communications. Cell systems were overloaded as well, and it seemed
the only way I could communicate with my spouse who had left work to head to
our pre-arranged Bug Out Location was by relaying through an out of town relative.
I also discovered that trying to organize your assets solo while simultaneously
keeping track of a small child and keeping an ear out for updates is much harder
than
when
you have time to think in peace. Finding a way to contain the child safely
and keep him entertained became a prerequisite to having my hands and mind
free to load up our gear.
I am thankful that the fire was managed and most folk returned home safely.
Our prayers and thoughts go out to the firefighters who saved our town and
to those neighbors whose homes were lost. - Anonymous
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Letter Re: Advice on Stocking Up on Batteries
Sir;
I was wondering: How many batteries should I store for all my radios, flashlights,
smoke detectors, and so forth? I'm also planning to get night vision goggles,
soon. I assume rechargeables, right? If so, what kind [of rechargeables], and
who has
the
best prices? - T.E.
in
Memphis.
JWR Replies: I recommend buying mainly nickel metal hydride
(NiMH) batteries. Stock up plenty of them, including some extras for
barter and charity. Unlike the older Nickel Cadmium (NiCd) technology, NiMHs
do not have
a "memory" effect.
(The diminished capacity because of the memory effect has always been one
of the greatest drawbacks to NiCds batteries.) The best of the breed are the latest Low Self Discharge (LSD) variants, such as the Sanyo Eneloop. One discount supplier with a
very good selection that I can enthusiastically recommend is All-Battery.com.
They
also have great prices on "throw away" batteries, such a lithium CR-123s.
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From the SurvivalBlog Archives: Start With a "List of Lists"
Start your retreat stocking effort by first composing a List of Lists, then
draft prioritized lists for each subject, on separate sheets of paper. (Or
in a spreadsheet if you are a techno-nerd like me. Just be sure to print out
a hard copy for use when the power grid goes down!) It is important to tailor
your lists to suit your particular geography, climate, and population density
as well as your peculiar needs and likes/dislikes. Someone setting up a retreat
in a coastal area is likely to have a far different list than someone living
in the Rockies.
As I often mention in my lectures and radio interviews, a great way to create
truly commonsense preparedness lists is to take a three-day weekend TEOTWAWKI Weekend Experiment” with your family. When you come home from work on
Friday evening, turn off your main circuit breaker, turn off your gas main
(or propane tank), and shut your main water valve (or turn off your well pump.)
Spend that weekend in primitive conditions. Practice using only your storage
food, preparing it on a wood stove (or camping stove.)
A “TEOTWAWKI Weekend Experiment” will surprise you. Things that
you take for granted will suddenly become labor intensive. False assumptions
will be shattered. Your family will grow closer and more confident. Most importantly,
some of the most thorough lists that you will ever make will be those written
by candlelight.
Your List of Lists should include: (Sorry that this post
is in outline form, but it would take a full length book to discus all of
the following in great detail)
Water List
Food Storage List
Food Preparation List
Personal List
First Aid /Minor Surgery List
Nuke Defense List
Biological Warfare Defense List
Gardening List
Hygiene List/Sanitation List
Hunting/Fishing/Trapping List
Power/Lighting/Batteries List
Fuels List
Firefighting List
Tactical Living List
Security-General
Security-Firearms
Communications/Monitoring List
Tools List
Sundries List
Survival Bookshelf List
Barter and Charity List
JWR’s Specific Recommendations For Developing Your Lists:
Water List
House downspout conversion sheet metal work and barrels. (BTW, this is another
good reason to upgrade your retreat to a fireproof metal roof.)
Drawing water from open sources. Buy extra containers. Don’t buy big
barrels, since five gallon food grade buckets are the largest size that most
people can handle without back strain.
For transporting water if and when gas is too precious to waste, buy a couple
of heavy duty two wheel garden carts--convert the wheels to foam filled "no
flats" tires. (BTW, you will find lots of other uses for those carts around
your retreat, such as hauling hay, firewood, manure, fertilizer, et cetera.)
Treating water. Buy plain Clorox hypochlorite bleach. A little goes a long
way. Buy some extra half-gallon bottles for barter and charity. If you can
afford it, buy a “Big Berky” British Berkefeld ceramic water filter.
(Available from Ready
Made Resources and several other Internet vendors. Even if you have pure
spring water at your retreat, you never know where you may end up, and a good
filter could be a lifesaver.)
Food Storage List
See my post tomorrow which will be devoted to food storage. Also see the recent
letter from David in Israel on this subject.
Food Preparation List
Having more people under your roof will necessitate having an oversize skillet
and a huge stew pot. BTW, you will want to buy several huge kettles, because
odds are you will have to heat water on your wood stove for bathing, dish washing,
and clothes washing. You will also need even more kettles, barrels, and 5 or
6 gallon PVC buckets--for water hauling, rendering, soap making, and dying.
They will also make great barter or charity items. (To quote my mentor Dr.
Gary North: “Nails: buy a barrel of them. Barrels: Buy a barrel of them!”)
Don’t overlook skinning knives, gut-buckets, gambrels, and meat saws.
Personal List
(Make a separate personal list for each family member and individual expected
to arrive at your retreat.)
Spare glasses.
Prescription and nonprescription medications.
Birth control.
Keep dentistry up to date.
Any elective surgery that you've been postponing
Work off that gut.
Stay in shape.
Back strength and health—particularly important, given the heavy manual
tasks required for self-sufficiency.
Educate yourself on survival topics, and practice them. For example, even if
you don’t presently live at your retreat, you should plant a vegetable
garden every year. It is better to learn through experience and make mistakes
now, when the loss of crop is an annoyance rather than a crucial event.
“Comfort” items to help get through high stress times. (Books, games,
CDs, chocolates, etc.)
First Aid /Minor Surgery List
When tailoring this list, consider your neighborhood going for many months
without power, extensive use of open flames, and sentries standing picket
shifts exposed in the elements. Then consider axes, chainsaws and tractors
being wielded by newbies, and a greater likelihood of gunshot wounds. With
all of this, add the possibility of no access to doctors or high tech medical
diagnostic equipment. Put a strong emphasis on burn treatment first aid supplies.
Don’t overlook do-it-yourself dentistry! (Oil of cloves, temporary
filling kit, extraction tools, et cetera.) Buy a full minor surgery outfit
(inexpensive Pakistani stainless steel instruments), even if you don’t
know how to use them all yet. You may have to learn, or you will have the
opportunity to put them in the hands of someone experienced who needs them.)
This is going to be a big list!
Chem/Nuke Defense List
Dosimeter and rate meter, and charger, radiac meter (hand held Geiger counter),
rolls of sheet plastic (for isolating airflow to air filter inlets and for
covering window frames in the event that windows are broken due to blast effects),
duct tape, HEPA filters (ands spares) for your shelter. Potassium iodate (KI)
tablets to prevent thyroid damage.(See my recent post on that subject.) Outdoor
shower rig for just outside your shelter entrance.
Biological Warfare Defense List
Disinfectants
Hand Sanitizer
Sneeze masks
Colloidal silver generator and spare supplies (distilled water and .999 fine
silver rod.)
Natural antibiotics (Echinacea, Tea Tree oil, …)
Gardening List
One important item for your gardening list is the construction of a very tall
deer-proof and rabbit-proof fence. Under current circumstances, a raid by deer
on your garden is probably just an inconvenience. After the balloon goes up,
it could mean the difference between eating well, and starvation.
Top Soil/Amendments/Fertilizers.
Tools+ spares for barter/charity
Long-term storage non hybrid (open pollinated) seed. (Non-hybrid “heirloom” seed
assortments tailors to different climate zones are available from The
Ark Institute
Herbs: Get started with medicinal herbs such as aloe vera (for burns), echinacea
(purple cone flower), valerian, et cetera.
Hygiene/Sanitation List
Sacks of powdered lime for the outhouse. Buy plenty!
TP in quantity (Stores well if kept dry and away from vermin and it is lightweight,
but it is very bulky. This is a good item to store in the attic. See my novel
about stocking up on used phone books for use as TP.
Soap in quantity (hand soap, dish soap, laundry soap, cleansers, etc.)
Bottled lye for soap making.
Ladies’ supplies.
Toothpaste (or powder).
Floss.
Fluoride rinse. (Unless you have health objections to the use of fluoride.)
Sunscreen.
Livestock List:
Hoof rasp, hoof nippers, hoof pick, horse brushes, hand sheep shears, styptic,
carding combs, goat milking stand, teat dip, udder wash, Bag Balm, elastrator
and bands, SWOT fly repellent, nail clippers (various sizes), Copper-tox, leads,
leashes, collars, halters, hay hooks, hay fork, manure shovel, feed buckets,
bulk grain and C-O-B sweet feed (store in galvanized trash cans with tight
fitting lids to keep the mice out), various tack and saddles, tack repair tools,
et cetera. If your region has selenium deficient soil (ask your local Agricultural
extension office) then be sure to get selenium-fortified salt blocks rather
than plain white salt blocks--at least for those that you are going to set
aside strictly for your livestock.
Hunting/Fishing/Trapping List
“Buckshot” Bruce Hemming has produced an excellent series of videos
on trapping and making improvised traps. (He also sells traps and scents at very
reasonable prices.)
Night vision gear, spares, maintenance, and battery charging
Salt. Post-TEOTWAWKI, don’t “go hunting.” That would be a
waste of effort. Have the game come to you. Buy 20 or more salt blocks. They
will also make very valuable barter items.
Sell your fly fishing gear (all but perhaps a few flies) and buy practical
spin casting equipment.
Extra tackle may be useful for barter, but probably only in a very long term
Crunch.
Buy some frog gigs if you have bullfrogs in your area. Buy some crawfish traps
if you have crawfish in your area.
Learn how to rig trot lines and make fish traps for non-labor intensive fishing WTSHTF.
Power/Lighting/Batteries List
One proviso: In the event of a “grid
down” situation, if you are the only family in the area with power,
it could turn your house into a “come loot me” beacon at night.
At the same time, your house lighting will ruin the night vision of your LP/OP pickets.
Make plans and buy materials in advance for making blackout screens or fully
opaque curtains for your windows.
When possible, buy nickel metal hydride batteries. (Unlike the older nickel
cadmium technology, these have no adverse charge level “memory” effect.)
If your home has propane appliances, get a “tri-fuel” generator--with
a carburetor that is selectable between gasoline, propane, and natural gas.
If you heat your home with home heating oil, then get a diesel-burning generator.
(And plan on getting at least one diesel burning pickup and/or tractor). In
a pinch, you can run your diesel generator and diesel vehicles on home heating
oil.
Kerosene lamps; plenty of extra wicks, mantles, and chimneys. (These will also
make great barter items.)
Greater detail on do-it-yourself power will be included in my forthcoming blog
posts.
Fuels List
Buy the biggest propane, home heating oil, gas, or diesel tanks that your local
ordinances permit and that you can afford. Always keep them at least two-thirds
full. For privacy concerns, ballistic impact concerns, and fire concerns,
underground tanks are best if you local water table allows it. In any case,
do not buy an aboveground fuel tank that would visible from any public road
or navigable waterway. Buy plenty of extra fuel for barter. Don’t overlook
buying plenty of kerosene. (For barter, you will want some in one or two
gallon cans.) Stock up on firewood or coal. (See my previous blog posts.)
Get the best quality chainsaw you can afford. I prefer Stihls and Husqavarnas.
If you can afford it, buy two of the same model. Buy extra chains, critical
spare parts, and plenty of two-cycle oil. (Two-cycle oil will be great for
barter!) Get a pair of Kevlar chainsaw safety chaps. They are expensive but
they might save yourself a trip to the emergency room. Always wear gloves,
goggles, and ear-muffs. Wear a logger’s helmet when felling. Have someone
who is well experienced teach you how to re-sharpen chains. BTW, don’t
cut up your wood into rounds near any rocks or you will destroy a chain in
a hurry.
Firefighting List
Now that you have all of those flammables on hand (see the previous list) and
the prospect of looters shooting tracer ammo or throwing Molotov cocktails
at your house, think in terms of fire fighting from start to finish without
the aid of a fire department. Even without looters to consider, you should
be ready for uncontrolled brush or residential fires, as well as the greater
fire risk associated with greenhorns who have just arrived at your retreat
working with wood stoves and kerosene lamps!
Upgrade your retreat with a fireproof metal roof.
2” water line from your gravity-fed storage tank (to provide large water
volume for firefighting)
Fire fighting rig with an adjustable stream/mist head.
Smoke and CO detectors.
Tactical Living List
Adjust your wardrobe buying toward sturdy earth-tone clothing. (Frequent your
local thrift store and buy extras for retreat newcomers, charity, and barter.)
Dyes. Stock up on some boxes of green and brown cloth dye. Buy some extra for
barter. With dye, you can turn most light colored clothes into semi-tactical
clothing on short notice.
Two-inch wide burlap strip material in green and brown. This burlap is available
in large spools from Gun Parts Corp. Even if you don’t have time now,
stock up so that you can make camouflage ghillie
suits post-TEOTWAWKI.
Save those wine corks! (Burned cork makes quick and cheap face camouflage.)
Cold weather and foul weather gear—buy plenty, since you will be doing
more outdoor chores, hunting, and standing guard duty.
Don’t overlook ponchos and gaiters.
Mosquito repellent.
Synthetic double-bag (modular) sleeping bags for each person at the retreat,
plus a couple of spares. The Wiggy’s
brand Flexible Temperature Range Sleep System (FTRSS)
made by Wiggy's of Grand Junction, Colorado is highly recommended.
Night vision gear + IR floodlights for your retreat house
Subdued flashlights and penlights.
Noise, light, and litter discipline. (More on this in future posts--or perhaps
a reader would like to send a brief article on this subject)
Security-General: Locks, intrusion detection/alarm systems, exterior obstacles
(fences, gates, 5/8” diameter (or larger) locking road cables, rosebush
plantings, “decorative” ponds (moats), ballistic protection (personal
and residential), anti-vehicular ditches/berms, anti-vehicular concrete “planter
boxes”, razor wire, etc.)
Starlight electronic light amplification scopes are critical tools for retreat
security.
A Starlight scope (or goggles, or a monocular) literally amplifies low ambient
light by up to 100,000 times, turning nighttime darkness into daylight--albeit
a green and fuzzy view. Starlight light amplification technology was first
developed during the Vietnam War. Late issue Third Generation (also called
or “Third Gen” or “Gen 3”) starlight scopes can cost
up to $3,500 each. Rebuilt first gen (early 1970s technology scopes can often
be had for as little as $500. Russian-made monoculars (with lousy optics) can
be had for under $100. One Russian model that uses a piezoelectric generator
instead of batteries is the best of this low-cost breed. These are best used
as backups (in case your expensive American made scopes fail. They should not
be purchased for use as your primary night vision devices unless you are on
a very restrictive budget. (They are better than nothing.) Buy the best starlight
scopes, goggles, and monoculars you can afford. They may be life-savers! If
you can afford to buy only one, make it a weapon sight such as an AN/PVS-4,
with a Gen 2 (or better) tube. Make sure to specify that that the tube is new
or “low hours”, has a high “line pair” count, and minimal
scintillation. It is important to buy your Starlight gear from a reputable
dealer. The market is crowded with rip-off artists and scammers. One dealer
that I trust, is Al Glanze (spoken “Glan-zee”) who runs STANO
Components, Inc. in Silver City, Nevada. Note: In a subsequent
blog posts I will discuss the relationship and implications to IR illuminators
and tritium sights.
Range cards and sector sketches.
If you live in the boonies, piece together nine of the USGS 15-minute maps,
with your retreat property on the center map. Mount that map on an oversize
map board. Draw in the property lines and owner names of all of your surrounding
neighbor’s parcels (in pencil) in at least a five mile radius. (Get boundary
line and current owner name info from your County Recorder’s office.)
Study and memorize both the terrain and the neighbors’ names. Make a
phone number/e-mail list that corresponds to all of the names marked on the
map, plus city and county office contact numbers for quick reference and tack
it up right next to the map board. Cover the whole map sheet with a sheet of
heavy-duty acetate, so you can mark it up just like a military commander’s
map board. (This may sound a bit “over the top”, but remember,
you are planning for the worst case. It will also help you get to know your
neighbors: When you are introduced by name to one of them when in town, you
will be able to say, “Oh, don’t you live about two miles up the
road between the Jones place and the Smith’s ranch?” They will
be impressed, and you will seem like an instant “old timer.”
Security-Firearms List
Guns, ammunition, web gear, eye and ear protection, cleaning equipment,
carrying cases, scopes, magazines, spare parts, gunsmithing tools, targets
and target
frames, et cetera. Each rifle and pistol should have at least six top quality
(original military contract or original manufacturer) full capacity spare magazines.
Note: Considerable detail on firearms and optics selection, training, use,
and logistic support are covered in the SurvivalBlog archives and FAQs.
Communications/Monitoring List
When selecting radios buy only models that will run on 12 volt DC power or
rechargeable nickel metal hydride battery packs (that can be recharged from
your retreat’s 12 VDC power system without having to use an inverter.)
As a secondary purchasing goal, buy spare radios of each type if you can afford
them. Keep your spares in sealed metal boxes to protect them from EMP.
If you live in a far inland region, I recommend buying two or more 12 VDC marine
band radios. These frequencies will probably not be monitored in your region,
leaving you an essentially private band to use. (But never assume that any
two-way radio communications are secure!)
Note: More detail on survival communications gear selection, training, use,
security/cryptography measures, antennas, EMP protection, and logistical support
will be covered in forthcoming blog posts.
Tools List
Gardening tools.
Auto mechanics tools.
Welding.
Bolt cutters--the indispensable “universal key.”
Woodworking tools.
Gunsmithing tools.
Emphasis on hand powered tools.
Hand or treadle powered grinding wheel.
Don’t forget to buy plenty of extra work gloves (in earth tone colors).
Sundries List:
Systematically list the things that you use on a regular basis, or that you
might need if the local hardware store were to ever disappear: wire of various
gauges, duct tape, reinforced strapping tape, chain, nails, nuts and bolts,
weather stripping, abrasives, twine, white glue, cyanoacrylate glue, et cetera.
Book/Reference List
You should probably have nearly every book on my Bookshelf
page. For some, you will want to have two or three copies, such as Carla
Emery’s "Encyclopedia of Country Living". This is because these books
are so valuable and indispensable that you won’t want to risk lending
out your only copy.
Barter and Charity List
For your barter list, acquire primarily items that are durable, non-perishable,
and either in small packages or that are easily divisible. Concentrate on
the items that other people are likely to overlook or have in short supply.
Some of my favorites are ammunition. [The late] Jeff Cooper referred to it
as “ballistic
wampum.” WTSHTF, ammo will be worth nearly its weight in silver.
Store all of your ammo in military surplus ammo cans (with seals that are
still soft) and it will store for decades. Stick to common calibers, get
plenty of .22 LR (most
high velocity hollow points) plus at least ten boxes of the local favorite
deer hunting cartridge, even if you don’t own
a rifle chambered for this cartridge. (Ask your local sporting goods shop
about their top selling chamberings). Also buy at least ten boxes of the
local police department’s standard pistol cartridge, again even if
you don’t own a pistol chambered for this cartridge.
Ladies supplies.
Salt (Buy lots of cattle blocks and 1 pound canisters of iodized table salt.)
(Stores indefinitely if kept dry.)
Two cycle engine oil (for chain saw gas mixing. Gas may still be available
after a collapse, but two-cycle oil will probably be like liquid gold!)
Gas stabilizer.
Diesel antibacterial additive.
50-pound sacks of lime (for outhouses).
1 oz. bottles of military rifle bore cleaner and Break Free (or similar) lubricant.
Waterproof dufflebags in earth tone colors (whitewater rafting "dry bags").
Thermal socks.
Semi-waterproof matches (from military rations.)
Military web gear (lots of folks will suddenly need pistol belts, holsters,
magazine pouches, et cetera.)
Pre-1965 silver dimes.
1-gallon cans of kerosene.
Rolls of olive drab parachute cord.
Rolls of olive-drab duct tape.
Spools of monofilament fishing line.
Rolls of 10 mil "Visqueen", sheet plastic (for replacing windows,
isolating airspaces for nuke scenarios, etc.)
I also respect the opinion of one gentleman with whom I've corresponded, who
recommended the following:
Strike anywhere matches. (Dip the heads in paraffin to make them waterproof.)
Playing cards.
Cooking spices. (Do a web search for reasonably priced bulk spices.)
Rope & string.
Sewing supplies.
Candle wax and wicking.
Lastly, any supplies necessary for operating a home-based business. Some that
you might consider are: leather crafting, small appliance repair, gun repair,
locksmithing, et cetera. Every family should have at least one home-based business
(preferably two!) that they can depend on in the event of an economic collapse.
Stock up on additional items to dispense to refugees as charity.
Note: See the Barter Faire chapter in my novel "Patriots" for
lengthy lists of potential barter items.
« Letter Re: Frozen Livestock Water Tank Woes |Main| Notes from JWR: »
AA Cells and Mobile Power, by Brandon in Utah
The size AA battery is the ubiquitous form of mobile power that is presently
available. There is a large amount of off the shelf devices that use AA cells.
They
are available everywhere at low cost. They are cost effective and very safe
for lighting. The breadth and depth of equipment available in a portable
format is unparalleled by any other type of battery. I will cover the known
factors
on how to care for and use this resource to help end users get the most out
of their equipment.
To start, some general information that covers all types of cells. Cells
do not like heat. Heat increases the chemical reactions occurring inside
the cell,
and thus the self-discharge and other chemical reactions in cell. A cell will
lose it's charge and lower it's life span. Keep them cool.
Cells shouldn't get wet. Keep them away from moisture. You should avoid circumstances
that will result in condensation on the cell.
Do not drop or roughly handle them. Especially in the case of rechargeables,
you can break the separator inside the cell and you may end up with complete
cell failure. Inside of a device they're a little more durable, your device
will provide some impact protection and buffering.
Do not store your batteries inside of your device for long term readiness.
There is a good reason they never come this way from the manufacture in the
package.
It's not good for your battery and you run a much larger risk of cells leaking
or venting into your device. On a short term basis in a device that sees regular
use, leaving the battery in is fine.
Matched cells perform better. A battery will only perform as well as the weakest
cell. Avoid mixing brands, dates, and especially chemistries and you will get
the most out of your cells. The more cells a device has, the more matches cells
you need to provide. So it's easier to feed devices that use a smaller number
of cells.
In general, take care of them and they'll serve you well.
Primary (use once) cells are the most straight forward. They usually have expiration
dates printed on the cell or package. It's important to note that this date
is an average amount of time for a specified failure rate. "Fail" is
defined as having less than ~85% capacity (depends on manufacture), thought
it can also mean complete failure with 0% recoverable capacity. The closer
a battery is to it's expiration date, the less capacity it will have and the
more likely you are to encounter completely failed cells. Even with expired
cells though, they often work. I wouldn't choose to use them in really important
applications, but they are still useful.
"Heavy duty" cells generally are not worth messing with - they are
cheap, light weight, and low capacity. They seem to only be made to sell to the "lowest
possible price" consumers. I would never buy or store them.
Alkaline are the best bang for the buck primary cells. You can pick up a pack
of 48 cells for around $10 at COSTCO last I checked (Duracell is believed to
be the OEM for Kirkland brand cells). The price has gone up approximate 10-15%
in the last year, which seems likely to continue. Alkaline's are good performers
under "average" conditions. They do not like low temperatures, and
they do not like high current draw (cameras, some flashlights, and possibly
other devices). Once you place a battery into a device, I recommend you use
it up. Do not return [primary] cells into storage once you've started to
use them.
Lithium cells provide the widest temperature and current rating of all primary
cells, though you pay the most for the best performance. I do recommend having
a few for important gear, red dot sights, night vision,and so forth, [reserving
them] especially for emergency winter use.
Rechargeable cells are much more economical for the regular user. Unfortunately
they require better understanding to maximize their useful life. So I'll go
over NiMH extensively and also address NiCd.
In a quick overview of the current tech of AA cells. NiCd is the most durable
battery chemistry, it has capacities ranging from 600-1000 [mil-Amp Hours]
(mAH)
It has the best temperature performance envelope, endures heat and over charge
best, will
operate with more cycles. NiMH is the most common consumer cell these days,
mostly due to the capacity advantage which run in the 1800-2700 mAH range at
present. NiMH also has a new variant on the market I will dub low self discharge
(LSD) cells. LSD cells are in the range of 2000-2100 mAH as of this writing
and have many advantages over traditional NiMH that mostly come from an effort
to stabilize it. They are new, so some data points are not borne out over years,
but current evidence indicates that they perform as advertised. I recommend
LSD cells for most people over all other varieties, I'll go into more detail
why below. First, the brands and types currently on the market. The top brand
in my opinion is Eneloops (2000 mAH) from Sanyo, it simply does the low-self-discharge
thing better than the competition. The rest of the field
seems to originate from a single manufacture or the same licensed design, but
there are a bunch of competing cells. Rayovac Hybrids, Hybrios, Titanium Enduros,
and a bunch of others (2100 mAH). Given equivalent, or near equivalent prices,
I'd pick the eneloops.
In both types of chemistry, the higher capacity cells are more fragile than
the lower capacity cells. It's an engineering trade off. The 2700 mAH whiz
bang top-of-the-line cells are not your best bet for good durable cells, they
are
actually fairly fragile (chemically and physically) because of this trade off.
Around 2000 mAH is not only cheaper (usually) but yields a cell that will see
a longer service life, more cycles, and less likely to fail if dropped. Lower
than 2000 in NiMH does not appear to hold significant advantage in durability
in most respects. LSD cells appear to be at least as durable as their 2000
mAH NiMH counterparts.
Standard NiMH cells have an approximately life span of 3 years. Cheaper brands
may have less. NiCd cells have an estimated 5+ year life span. Much beyond
these points or even before them (especially with high capacity cells), increased
internal resistance, lowered capacities, and higher self discharge are the
norm. NiCd doesn't exhibit a large amount of this and usually fails with internal
shorts (complete failure) or excessively high resistance. These numbers are
very temperature dependant, colder storage conditions will lengthen the time,
warmer will lower it. LSD NiMH cells currently have no data in this regard,
they're advertised as having better longevity than NiMH cells, and I would
tend to believe them due to the engineering trade offs picked. However, they've
only been out for about 1.5-2 years now. To date, my oldest cells (1.5 years
old), lightly used, perform like new - so far so good.
Self discharge is one of the biggest inconvenient things about rechargeable
cell use. NiMH cells discharge by themselves very quickly. They discharge on
the order of a couple of months when new and the rate increases significantly
with age and use. NiCd cells have about half the self discharge rate and this
usually won't vary much up until cell death. LSD cells shine in this regard,
the self discharge slows down after a charge to almost a stand still in a little
over a months time. LSD cells will retain around 85% (Eneloops) to 80% (rest
of the field) charge after a year of storage at around 70 degrees.
Keeping the voltages up during use is important for many devices and one of
the principle reasons rechargeables deliver poor performance in some devices.
Standard NiMH suffers from voltage sag over time. It will start out at a nice
high 1.4 volts fresh off the charger. Soon it finds it's way to 1.3-to-1.2
v open voltage. If left on the shelf it will fall over time. Many devices require
a minimum voltage to operate correctly, if this minimum is above what your
battery can deliver under load your device will shut down (can be 1.2v per
cell, and NiMH will often fail to meet this under less than ideal circumstances!)
If you experience significant performance difference between primary cells
and rechargeable cells (especially older ones) this is likely the problem,
especially combined with self discharge "usable capacity" drops
very quickly. NiCd cells can suffer from a form of voltage sag, it is not as
pronounced as NiMH but it can also happen in mid-discharge and is related the
over marketed term cell "memory". This problem can usually be corrected
with a couple exercise cycles and a good top off charge. LSD cells retain their
voltage very well on the shelf, like their charge, and also deliver better
than average voltages in normal use anyway. You will usually see much better
performance from LSD cells in these voltage sensitive devices than NiMH or
even NiCd. If you've been frustrated with rechargeables in the past in some
of your devices give some LSD cells a try!
The most common method to kill cells is poor charging practices. I can't stress
this enough, especially with NiMH cells, buy a good ["smart"] charger.
Usually cells are allowed to "cook" on a standard charger for far,
far too long. Remember, heat is bad! It's normal for them to get warm at the
end
of
a charge cycle
(not burning hot!). If they continue to stay warm (or worse, hot) for several
hours later, you have a [traditional "dumb"] charger that is cooking your cells.
I recommend a Maha-C9000 as a good high end charger. On a lower budget I recommend
a Duracell
15 minute
charger. {To be ready for various circumstances,] I prefer to have both chargers
available. The C9000 is a slower charger (relatively) but it will not cook
your cells, you can leave them in the unit. The unit has options that allow
you
to easily
exercise
cells
and
see if they are
improving.
You can match cells to obtain the best performance from them and identify poor
performing cells quickly. It also charges individual cells rather than pairs,
which is better for them - especially a mismatched pair. The Duracell 15 minute
charger is a quality unit that also allows "busy you" to not walk away for
hours waiting for, and forgetting about, your batteries. You will be less likely
to forget about them and allow them to be cooked on the charger. Some good
charging technology goes into the 15 minute chargers, so while they are a little
rough compared to a good slower charge - they are actually very good at what
they do, especially compared to the cheap junk [chargers] on the market. Fast
charging is also fairly energy efficient, reducing the power required to get
a full
charge. Both of these chargers run on 12 volt DC input so they can plug directly
into 12 volt systems allowing for use in a car or directly off a battery based
[alternative energy] system (PV,
wind, etc).
Do not charge cells when they are below freezing (32
F/0 C). You will damage them. If you really need a charged cell, warm it up
in your pocket (preferably the charger too) and use the 15 minute charger.
The charge cycle should provide enough heat to keep it above freezing until
it's done. Avoid chargers that come with your cells, generally they are poor.
When brought out of long term storage, cells will usually need "exercise".
NiCds especially need fairly significant exercise before returning to full
capacity. 5+ full cycles may be required, rule of thumb is exercise until you
stop seeing capacity gains. This is easiest with a charger like the C9000 with
capacity readouts. NiCds should be stored discharged. NiMH cells should be
stored with a charge. LSD cells require significantly less maintenance and
may not need any exercise at all and will likely have a serviceable charge
intact after storage, depending on the length of time in storage and at what
temperature.
NiMH cells like to be treated gently. When you're done with your device, recharge
the cells. The more shallow the cycle the better. Full cycles will wear on
them the most. Keep NiMH cells topped off and they'll last the longest. Occasionally
you may need to perform a deep cycle to restore some performance if the cell
appears to be waning. The more advanced NiMH care systems like on the Toyota
Prius reportedly keep cells at 60-80% capacity and only use about 20% depth
in discharge cycles, which seems to be the most chemically repeatable and stable
region. NiCds stand up to abuse a lot better, in fact a regular full discharge
is good for them and will help you avoid issues with the cells. It's not required
for every charge, but once a month or so should keep it's performance high.
I suggest avoiding C and D size rechargeable cells. They are expensive, there
are no LSD variants at present, your charging options are more limited, they
take forever to charge, and there are adapter sleeves readily available
to make AA cells fit these sizes. D sized alkaline cells are reasonable for
storage
and use for the price. C size cells are usually overpriced and are often repackaged
AA cells anyway - use the adapters. COSTCO presently sells an excellent Eneloop
kit that includes 8 AAs, 4 AAAs, 2 AA->C adapters, 2 AA->D adapters,
and a cheap charger for $26.
Earlier generation NiMH cells had a very poor temperature envelope. There are
evidences that this has improved and the LSD introduction advertised even better
cold
temperature performance. Unfortunately, to date, I am unable to find information
or a datasheet to quantify this. I've done a bit of my own testing down to
0 F, the limit of my freezer, and have found no appreciable drop in capacity
(old NiMH tech struggled below freezing). I can't really quantify if LSD NiMH
is inferior or superior to NiCds at present, so suffice it to say they both
do reasonably well in the cold (just remember not to charge them when they
are below freezing).
In summary, I don't see any reason to buy any non-LSD NiMH cells these days.
LSD tech has dramatically improve the performance and user friendliness of
the cells, and hopefully longevity, durability, and cycle life too. However,
it is new and relatively unproven tech. NiCd is the old known workhorse and
there is good reason why power tools and similar equipment still ship with
NiCd cells. It's worth having a few NiCds around as a backup because of their
track record. For general use, the Sanyo Eneloops are the way to go.
« Odds 'n Sods: |Main| Note from JWR: »
Prepare or Die, by J. Britely
Throughout my life I have been
caught unprepared several times and while nothing seriously bad happened, it
easily could have. I have been
lost hiking. My car has broken
down in very bad
neighborhoods - twice. I have
been close enough to riots
that I feared they would spread to my neighborhood, been in earthquakes, been
too close to wildfires, been stuck in a blizzard,
and have been without power and water for several days after a hurricane. I managed to get myself out of
each situation, I thanked God, and tried to learn from my mistakes. I could have avoided these situations
or made them much less unsafe and worrisome if I had been more aware and
prepared. I have also tried to
learn from the mistakes of others
so as to not learn everything the hard way. One group I assisted was a two hour drive into the
mountains, out of gas, wearing tee shirts, and had empty water bottles (at
least they kept them) (I have made each of those mistakes but not all at the
same time).
I aspire to be more prepared the
next time. My preparedness
includes many different aspects.
In my opinion, the most important thing I have done is to learn as much
as possible about what to expect and how to deal with those situations. The other important thing that gives me
some piece of mind is that I carry
and stock away water, food, ammo, books, and other tools and equipment that
should help me survive a bad situation.
Be prepared!
The other inspiration for my
preparations is my family. Seeing
my family suffer from lack of water or food would be very hard for me,
especially if some easy and cheap preparations could have made a big
difference. Recently, a few
friends and family have asked me about my preparations and how they might
prepare. I didn't have a good
short answer because I have spent years learning and stocking away. I thought of myself as more of a
student than a teacher in this area, but now I think I do know enough to give
some basic advice and refer them to good sources for more. Hopefully, they (and you) can learn
from my mistakes without having to waste time, energy and money on things that
don't work. Of course, I haven't
been through every situation or disaster but I have made it through a few tough
spots without losing my head. My
advice is based upon what I know to work and also what sounds like it would
work with the minimum fuss. I
always prefer the cheap, easy, home-made solution, but
sometimes it is worth the cost to get a quality item that is just too hard to
improvise or where the manufactured solution is much better (such as a
knife). Keep it simple stupid
(KISS) when you can. With
persistence you can get a lot done $20 at a time.
The purpose of this document is
to give an overview of preparedness and the first steps to take. I focus more on the why than the what
so that you can tailor your preparedness to your own situation and budget. I will also cite the best sources I
have found for more information.
There is a lot of information out there in books, classes, web sites,
and forums. Most of it is good but it is also really repetitious and
overwhelming. This document is
only about 15 pages printed out (you are printing important information (not
necessarily this) aren't you - since in an emergency you may not have power and
need to take the information with you).
I try to keep my important preparedness documents in an expandable file
folder with a tie inside a plastic crate.
What are you preparing for?
No one really knows what will be
the next survival situation they will face or how it will play out (will it get
worse before it gets better?). It
could be getting lost hiking, the car getting two flats in the middle of the
desert, a hurricane, a home invasion, an earthquake, or a terrorist
attack. You must assess your own
situation and determine what you need to prepare for. Of course some preparations will be useful in many
situations including everyday life, and these are the best type.
In order to get an idea of what
to prepare for, look at the types of situations that you or people similar to
you have been through. Also,
assess where you live or spend a lot of time such as work and vacation. We need to learn from the past but
without fighting the last war.
I like hiking and being
outdoors, so for me learning how
not to get lost and how to stay alive in the outdoors are high
priorities. These skills may also
come in handy if I need to walk to safety during a terrorist attack because all
of the roads and public transportation are closed. Living in your house without power or water isn't too
different from camping
except for the nice roof over your head and all of your stuff. I have also taken a first
aid class. It is pretty
limited in coverage but still useful in a variety of situations.
To assess the likely dangers to
where I live and work I used several sources including FEMA (free guide), DHS, Disaster Center, Emergency
Essentials, Two
Tigers and CBS. Also, find your local emergency
response office. But don't
rely on the government too much for planning or for help. As we relearned with the Katrina
response, their information and advice is far from perfect. And FEMA has always said it will take
72 hours to respond. So the way
I
look at it, during Katrina, FEMA (and
local governments) failed to live up to
its own low expectations. But even
if FEMA had been able to provide more food and water, you would still be much
better off taking care of yourself.
Do you really want to be told what possessions you can hold, when to
eat, when to sleep, and live in close quarters with thousands of
strangers? Sounds like prison to
me.
It's
A Disaster is a good book that will get you started on a plan for most
disasters. Some of their plans are
a little passive for me (don't take any risks and follow all FEMA directions)
and their kits lack some important things like knives. Still, it is a very good book and a
great start. Family and friends
should be included in your planning and preparations as much as they want to
be, but be careful about telling people who you do not trust or know well. You do not want to become a target in a
crisis.
I
think one of the best sources for thinking about what you are preparing for
and what does and doesn't work is news and
first hand accounts. These are some of the best ones I have
found. A few of them seem kind of
glib and bravado but the advice seems sound.
True Stories of Survival
Hurricane Katrina: http://www.frfrogspad.com/disastr.htm
Argentina thread 1: http://www.clairewolfe.com/wolfesblog/arg.html
Argentina thread 2 (some
swearing): http://www.survivalmonkey.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2715
Airplane crash: http://www.equipped.com/waldock698.htm
Ground Zero: http://www.equipped.org/groundzero.htm
Karen Hood's Survival Journal (a week in the wilderness) http://www.survival.com/karen1.htm
Sailing to Hawaii http://www.equipped.com/0698rescue.htm
Tsunami http://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/c1187/
Alaska http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Rapids/8017/index2.html
A list of stories
Priorities
The survival Rule of Threes:
- It takes about three seconds to die without thinking
- It takes about three minutes to die without air
- It
takes about three hours to die without shelter
- It
takes about three days to die without water
- It
takes about three weeks to die without food
- It
takes about three months to die without hope
- Try to
have at least three ways of preventing each
of the above (a backup to your backup).
So the priorities are thinking,
air, shelter, water, food, and hope.
These are rules of thumb and approximations. Also, you will likely start feeling really bad before you
die so you need to be proactive in addressing these needs.
Thinking
Basically, don't panic
and do
something stupid. This is easier
said than done, but you can build your thinking skill and confidence by playing
“what if” games. After reading about the risks to your area and the survival
stories above, think about what kinds of things could go wrong and how you
would deal with them. The more
detail the better. What would you
do if a cat 5 hurricane was projected to hit your house? Where would you go? What would you take? Would it all fit in your car? Do you have enough gas to get there if
the gas stations are closed? What
if you don't have time to leave? What room in your house is safest (can you
reinforce it easily)?
If you are facing a serious
situation but no immediate threat, take the time to consider your options
before rushing into a course of action.
Take an inventory of what you have on hand and what is around you. Think of how each item could help solve
one or more of your priorities.
Thinking about these things may
be scary but it will be less scary when it actually happens if you have thought
it through. Focus on what you can
do to improve things and not on what you cannot change. Thinking can also be
more long term as in learning and planning. I suggest you read some of the sources below and then come
up with a plan for several types of situations that you are likely to
face. But don't delay, you can take
some first steps outlined below, such as storing water, right now. You can then read more, take classes
and collect useful items.
Preparing is a process not a one time event.
Air
Having breathable air is not
something you usually have to worry about, but it is an immediate priority if
you do. First aide can help with
choking and bleeding (which causes the body to not get needed oxygen). Hundreds
of people die from carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide poisoning
every year because of gas leaks and cooking
or heating indoors. Being at
altitude can also make it harder to breath. Finally, a terrorist attack could put dust, chemical,
biological, or nuclear contamination in the air or force you into a shelter
that needs ventilation. Be aware
of these dangers and have appropriate detectors if possible (smoke, carbon
monoxide, etc.). A wet cloth or
hand wipe (carry on airplane) to breathe through can help for dust or smoke.
Shelter
Shelter is mainly about staying
dry and the right temperature, but you also want to avoid sunburn, bugs,
animals and other dangers. Your
house is your usual primary shelter but it could become damaged or you may have
to evacuate. You should have
emergency repair items on hand such as tarps, lumber, shovels, nails, plastic
sheeting, crowbars, and a saw.
Your clothes are your first and
most important layer of shelter outdoors.
Clothes protect you from heat, cold and abrasions. In general silk, wool, and synthetic
materials are better than cotton especially to keep you warm in cold wet
weather. I find cotton more comfortable especially in hot weather, so I
compromise and wear a cotton shirt and shorts, but carry a better shirt, pants
and socks
in my bag, as well as additional layers and a change of underwear. This makes my pack a little heavier,
but I have been cold and wet in the wilds and that is miserable. For me, a hat and sunglasses are
indispensable. I try to always
carry at least a light water resistant jacket or poncho (with a garbage bag as
a backup). For me, boots are the
only sensible walking shoes. Find
some that are rugged and comfortable.
Have extra laces and a backup pair.
You can carry a tent, a tarp or garbage
bag for resting and sleeping.
A tarp can make a simple shelter or
an elaborate one. Rope, twine and tape are also
useful. You can carry some type of
staff
or tent
poles or make them with an ax or saw.
Mosquito netting is necessary in some places.
You should have many ways to
start a fire since most are cheap and compact. At least have a lighter, matches,
and flint. You can also build a firebed to sleep in if you have
inadequate shelter from the cold.
Water
This is a crucial area that
can be helped a lot with very cheap and easy actions before The Schumer
Hits The
Fan (TSHTF). This is probably the
thing
you can do with the highest payoff for amount of effort. The only problem with water is that it
is heavy and can take up a lot of room.
If you have storage room and are staying home this isn't a problem but
if you are on the move it can become a driving factor in your progress. Long term solutions are also difficult
if your primary water source (city water or well) goes out and you are not near
a river or lake.
Used plastic soda bottles and
orange juice jugs with screw tops make very convenient water storage containers. Just rinse them a few times with hot
water. Old liquor bottles and wine box bladders work well too. I also have several canteens and rugged
5
gallon containers with taps.
The five gallon containers weigh about 40 pounds each and are about as
big as can be easily moved (larger drums can go in your basement or garage or
under a rain spout). A few collapsible
containers might also be useful because they can be stored and carried
empty. Tap water can last for
years without going bad if kept in a cool dark place. But you should check water that has been stored for clarity
and odors. If in doubt, treat it
with one of the methods below. You
can also freeze the plastic soda or orange juice containers (these do crack sometimes
when freezing) and use them in a cooler to keep food cold if the power goes out
before drinking it. If you know
a
disaster is coming fill up any container you can including the coffee maker,
crystal vase, bucket, bathtub, sink, and kiddy pool (some of these could be
spilled or contaminated but hopefully some will make it).
Most sources recommend about a
gallon per person per day. People
consume about 2 quarts in cool low activity environments but much more if hot
or active. You should have at
least 2 weeks worth per person in your primary residence (but why not have
months worth if you have the room).
If you are traveling by car, three days worth per person is minimum
(more for bathing), and if you are walking take as much as you reasonably can
carry but at least one days worth (several small bottles are better for
diversification if one leaks and also to let you know to start looking for more
water before you are on your last bottle). I also store extra water for washing and bathing. Here the container doesn't matter quite
as much. I use old liquid
detergent jugs. You should also
have at least two methods of sterilizing water.
The first step in sterilizing
water is to get the water as clear as possible. If it is cloudy, strain it with coffee filters, a clean
cloth, or sand. Or you can let it
settle and pour off the more clear water.
The primary and most reliable
method of sterilizing water is boiling.
You actually do not need to boil the water just heat it past 145 degrees for long enough. But
if you don't do it right you can get sick. So to be safe, boil it for 5 minutes if you can. If you are
walking, a metal cup (enamel or stainless) or a converted tin can is easier to
boil than a full pot. You can
carry a backpacking
stove or a Kelly Kettle. You can
use solar power to sterilize
water (in a soda
bottle) if no cooking is possible.
Other stoves are suggested below under food.
To sterilize water
with bleach use 2 drops of plain unscented
bleach per quart of water (or 8 drops per gallon or 1⁄4 tsp per 2 gallons). If you don't have a dropper you can wet
a paper towel and then drip it (wear gloves). Let the water sit for 20 minutes and then smell it. If it smells like chorine then its good
to go. If it doesn't, repeat with
the same amount of bleach. If that
doesn't work try to find other water.
(Really bad water or salt water requires a still.) Bleach is cheap but does not last forever - rotate. Dry Calcium Hypochlorite {sold as "pool
shock" bleach) stores
much
better
than liquid bleach but requires an
additional step of mixing a solution. (It provides a very inexpensive long
term
solution
to
water treatment).
There are also Potable
Aqua iodine tablets that are more
compact for sterilizing water. You
can also use Tincture of
Iodine. Iodine and chlorine
are poisons so be very careful (kill the
bacteria not yourself. [Avoid ingesting chlorine or iodine crystals!])
Any of the chemical treatments
can make the water taste funny.
You can use drink mixes to make it taste better. I'm not sure if sports drinks are
really better, but Gatorade seems more thirst quenching to me than water. The powder form is more convenient and
cheaper. You can also make your own sports drink
(1/4 tsp nu salt (potassium chloride),
1⁄4
tsp
salt,
3-6 tbsp sugar (to taste), juice of 1 lemon (or orange), and optional flavoring
(Kool-Aid) per gallon of water) or switchel.
Of course you can spend money for water if you
want to. You can buy prepackaged water or expensive
filters. There are backpacking
filters but I have found these to be temperamental. A water
bottle with a filter would be a good backup or a straw.
You can also go the more expensive route with a good gravity fed filter like
this: http://www.doultonfilters.com/gravity.html. This is a great looking solar still but doesn't appear
to be for sale right now.
If you are a homebrewer (or like beer), you can add some
dry malt extract, hops, and dry yeast to your
stash. Beer is boiled as part of
the brewing process. Then the
alcohol and hops act as a natural preservative. For the long term you can get some sproutable barley, grow some hops, and culture yeast. If you or someone with you doesn't
handle alcohol well, skip this.
Food
Providing food can be as
easy or
complicated as you want. The
easiest thing to do is simply buy
more of any food you normally buy that stores well. By store well, I mean does not
spoil. Foods like fresh milk, meat
and bread do not store well. Other
foods like rice, dried beans and pasta all store well and are cheap. They eventually lose some of their
nutrition but this is gradual and will not make you sick from eating “expired”
food if you forget to rotate. I
do
not list exact rotation schedules because every source is different. Some sources say grains only last one
year but most sources say 10 plus years and other credible sources say hundreds
or thousands
of years. It all depends upon how
it is packed and where it is stored which is discussed below (vacuum packed,
cool and dry are best) Canned meats, fruits and vegetables store okay and are
more expensive.
How much food you want to have
on hand depends on what type of situation you expect and how much you want to
spend. Buying a month' worth of rice, beans,
salt, and pasta will not cost much (and
is a good start). You will be a
lot happier if you add:
- canned or dried
meat (Costco and BJs have multipaks of Spam, ham, tuna and chicken for
under $10)
- canned or dried fruits and nuts
- canned or dried vegetables
- dried potatoes
- canned or dried sauces (for
pasta, chili, etc.)
- soup mixes (bean soups are
cheap) and bullion
- dried onions
- parmesan cheese
- cooking oil
- ramen noodles
- peanut butter
- mayo
- vinegar
- sugar and honey
- powdered milk
- bread crumbs, stuffing, oatmeal,
cereal
- flour, pancake mix, biscuit mix
- baking soda
- cocoa, instant coffee, tea,
drink mixes, juice mixes (cranberry)
- lemon juice
- dry yeast
- spices
Some of these can be eaten
without cooking or water if you have to.
Costco is great for the rice, canned goods, bullion, yeast (2 pound
box), cooking oil and spices. Don't forget a can opener and other
utensils. Of course you can do the
drying (wood
or solar) and canning yourself
for better quality and lower cost.
The oil, flour, baking soda and yeast (refrigerate the yeast if
possible) do not store well and have to be rotated more frequently than the
rice, beans and pasta. You will
be
healthier if you add some multivitamins. There are also luxury items like
Powerbars, powdered eggs, powdered cheese, powdered butter, food tabs, and meals
ready to eat (MREs).
To decide how much you need, you
can simply scale up recipes
and meals (print some simple recipes that use your stored food). How much rice and beans would you eat
at a meal or in a day if that was all you ate? A lot probably (make a meal as a trial). Now multiply that by the number of
people and the number of days and you have a ball park of how much to
store. The problem is that you
could end up feeding more people than your immediate family. Who else would you not turn away?
(Anyone you wouldn't want to live with normally is not someone you want to be
stuck with in a crisis. That said
there is some family I wouldn't turn away even if they deserve it). Start with the cheap stuff (rice,
beans, pasta, salt) and then slowly keeping adding and rotating the other food
until you have at least one months worth.
Do an inventory at least twice a year.
Store everything in
airtight/waterproof containers inside a tough container in a cool, dry, dark
place. Some things come packed
pretty well and can just go in a plastic
bucket or crate (cans can
be dipped in wax). Other items
should be vacuum
packed in small bags or large mylar bags with oxygen absorbers and
then put in the plastic bucket with a lid or crate (with a solid latching
lid). If you don't have shelves,
you can make shelves out of the buckets or crates and 1”x12” lumber. Put 2”x4”'s under the bottom shelf to
keep it off the floor.
For years
worth of food instead of months worth of food we need to move to grain and grain grinders. The Church of Latter Day
Saints are the experts
here. They also have storehouses that will sell
to the public if you are polite.
Of course you can buy online
but the shipping will be as much or more than the food. I went cheap and was able to get about
six months worth of food for one person for $100. I stuck to grains (400 lbs/year), beans (40 lbs/year), soup
mix (20 lbs/year), and milk (16 lbs/year) (I already had sugar (60
pounds/year), salt (10 lbs/year), oil (5 gallons/year), baking soda and yeast). I borrowed some of their equipment to
pack some of the food, the rest I packed at home in the mylar bags and buckets
described above. The milk is a
sticky powder and very messy (think of spilling flour and multiply by 100),
repack it outside if possible. I
also bought a hand operated
grain grinder to make flour from the wheat. Then I can make bread
(scale this recipe up to one loaf per day for a year as a cross check for a
year's supply). This would be a
pretty miserable diet but I think it would keep me alive and healthy if I had
enough vitamins. Because of the
sack size I have more of some things than others so towards the end I may be
eating paste. I hope to upgrade later. For infants you need more milk, oil,
sugar, and vitamins from which you can make an emergency formula (breast
feeding is better, then you give the extra
food to the mother).
For even longer food solutions
you need to farm. Supplementing
your food with a garden
or sprouting would also make
things last longer and provide some healthy variety. Its best to have some non-hybrid seeds on
hand or save
seeds from your garden.
Serious (expensive) seed packages are here. Have some fertilizer and pesticides on
hand but in the long run organic
is the way to go.
For cooking you can use a wood
burning stove, barbeque, or camp
stove in the short run (have some extra fuel on hand). The Petromax
lantern is pricey but well made and also has a stove attachment. If you don't have one of these or run
out of fuel you can build one: a coffee can
stove, a bucket stove
(avoid galvanized metal),
a alcohol stove, a collapsible stove, a tin can stove (simple
version), solar
oven (portable version),
or a clay
stove (print directions for making at least one of these). This is also a good commercial stove for those with cash
to burn. These are much more
efficient than an open fire. You
need a good pot or dutch oven for
boiling water and cooking. For
more portable food you can go with MREs, make your own
or stock what ever you would normally backpack with.
Hope
Hope is different for
everyone. It can be safety,
comfort, companionship, or normalcy.
For me it is mainly hope that there is light at the end of the
tunnel. I can work hard and
persevere if I know eventually things will get better. This means long term planning. So I want to have what I need in the
short term but also have some hope for the long term (so I have gardening tools
and seeds in addition to rice and spam).
You also want comfort items such as a book, Bible, game, coloring book,
pictures, beer, tea, or warm
shower. Some of these can be
dual purpose such as a book about hiking or gardening, survival playing cards,
or a novel about survival and perseverance.
Equipment
There are lots of things you can get, but you can also
just organize what you have already. The number of lists
seems endless and what you need depends upon the situation, your skills, and
your budget. Here is what is wrong with
the DHS kit I have already
mentioned several items above and list some others here but being comprehensive
would take a lot of space (read the links and references for more). Here are some basics.
All types of camping equipment
and tools come in handy but can be
expensive (shipping can be expensive too so you may want to make your own, try your
local yard sales, craigslist,
sporting goods or hardware store first).
You may want a small tent to carry and a larger tent to put in the car. Sleeping
pads are as much for insulation as for comfort (learned the hard way—you
don't want to be in the cold without some insulation between you and the
ground). A hammock
can be multipurpose. You can
try your local hardware store for lanterns or Lehman's
(they also have candle making supplies).
I suggest four knives for anyone
responsible enough to have one (in general you get what you pay for, but start
cheap and upgrade later): a folding
lock blade knife (buck and gerber are both good reasonably priced brands), a
Swiss army knife (with saw blade) or leatherman type knife
(pliers are handy), a
solid full tang knife, and a machete or short sword for brush. A kitchen knife can work until you get
any of these. A hatchet would also
be useful. Keep them sharp.
You need several maps (local,
state (small scale and large scale), neighboring states, topographic and road)
and a compass. A GPS
is optional but very handy. There
are usually welcome centers along interstates and in some cities that hand out
free maps. The USGS is a good source for reasonably
priced maps but sometimes it is a bit hard to find what you are looking
for. They have a catalog
for each state that really helps. They are also very friendly by phone but
still prefer if you order online.
You should have at least one non
portable (plug in) phone that can be used with the power out. Medicine, diapers and feminine products
will be hard to get. A generator
is great but can be expensive and you must have enough fuel (I don't have one
but want one). Solar
powered battery chargers are really slow but might be the only option.
Change your attitude, don't be
wasteful, and you can reuse many items. A tin can becomes a cup or pot with
a
little work. Use both sides of a
piece of paper and then use it as insulation or tinder. Waste not, want not. This also minimizes trash as there may
be no trash pickup.
Organize your equipment and supplies into different
levels and packages
Stuff you almost always carry
You should make a small kit that
fits in your pocket or
around your neck. This should include:
- ways to make a fire (matches,
mini bic, flint, etc.)
- a button
compass
- a small knife or razor blade,
broken hack saw blade, small file
- Swiss Tech Micro-Tech
6-in-1 Tool
- led light
- small candle (light or fire
making)
- a saw
- short piece of wire
- parachute cord (as much as will
fit)
- iodine tablets
- sturdy needle and thread
- individual salt servings
- food tabs, hard candy, bullion
or individual parmesan cheese/sugar (if space permits)
- freezer bags (water)
- nails (assortment)
- trash bag if it will fit (poncho
or tarp)
- dental floss (twine)
- Advil, Imodium, Benadryl,
vitamins, band aids, SPF chapstick any other essential medicine for you
or your family (all labeled)
- fish hooks, split shot, fish
line, safety pins.
- Survival
cards can go in kit or wallet (you can make something similar).
Personal Fanny Pack (or vest)
This should be small enough and
attached to you so that you do not put it down even when you take a break. Take it with you on any hike, drive or
emergency. A large fanny pack
works well or Ranger Rick
suggests putting everything in a vest and a bamboo walking stick. You can duplicate some of the items in
your mini kit but add substantially.
- Survival
cards or pocket
survival guide (or print some out).
- Knife of your choice (another
one can go in your pocket or on your belt)
- Sharpening
stone (or ceramic
insulator)
- Fire materials (matches and tender
(dryer lint, cotton balls in Vaseline, small candles, etc.) waterproofed)
- Magnifying glass wrapped in
bandana
- Pliers if your knife doesn't
have them
- Compass
- Maps
- Metal cup (boiling water)
- 2 small bottles of water
- Freezer bags (organization,
waterproofing and for more water)
- Small camp soap (or traveler's
shampoo)
- Iodine tablets
- At least 2 trash bags (clear for
still and heavy black for shelter), or tarp and poncho, or space blanket,
or light weight jacket with hood (a shell that compacts) or hat
- Rope, twine and wire
- Headlamp and extra batteries
- Candle
- Wipes
(these are multipurpose and are more compact than toilet paper, keep them
in zip lock bags (add a little water if they get dry))
- Gloves and socks
- Small first aide kit (including
prescriptions)
- Sunscreen and bug repellant.
- Whistle
- Snacks (powerbars, trail mix,
food tabs, tea, Gatorade mix, bullion, beef jerky, MRE)
- A GPS, FRS radio, am/fm radio,
cell phone, or CB can go in here if it fits
- Mini binoculars (to spot
landmarks, approaching fires, etc.)
- Notepad and pencil or pen
- A multipurpose
tool is a good backup for the other items.
72 hour kit (or less)
To some, the 72 hour kit is
everything they have in their house for disasters. I think this should be what you take with you if you have to
evacuate (even on foot). If you
can't carry 72 hours worth of food and water (that is a lot of water even if
you only plan 2 quarts per day), scale it down and put the rest in a car bug
out kit that can be used in your house or on the road. You can also make a similar kit for work
or other places you are likely to be in an emergency. It should be in a medium sized backpack that you can easily
carry (get
a rain cover for the backpack (or make one)—these really help in wet
conditions). Again, repeat items
in your smaller kits as you see fit.
Here are some suggestions:
- It's
a Disaster! Book (or print out a similar one)
- Personal mini-kit and fanny pack
or vest (attached to you separately from the backpack)
- Water (as much as you can fit
without making the bag too heavy, you can carry some containers empty and
fill them later)
- Changes of clothes (several
underwear and socks, long underwear)
- Jacket, hat, and sunglasses
- Sleeping
bag or blanket (and compact pad), hammock
- Soap and other toiletries (comb,
nail clippers and razor)
- Small stove and/or lantern (or
directions and supplies for making one of the stoves above)
- Small tent or tarp and netting,
plastic sheeting, tent poles and stakes (multipurpose)
- Stuff sacks, mesh bags, pillow
cases for organization
- Duct tape
- Hatchet or machete, folding saw
- Small shovel
- Rope, twine and bungee cords
- Backpacking pot/pan
- Cooking and eating utensils
(kitchen knife, can opener, spatula, spoon, forks, plates, cups)
- Foil
- Dish soap, sponge, dish pan or
bucket (collapsible) (also a wash basin or bucket), towel
- Food (Snacks and MREs as well as
rice)
- Vitamins
- Detailed road maps
- topo
maps
- Extra ammo
- Pocket warmers
- A GPS, FRS radio (everyone with
a list of channels to use), am/fm radio, solar calculator, or CB (whatever
you have that fits)
- Copies of important documents,
phone numbers, extra credit card, cash, ID
- Comfort items (book, cards,
bible, pictures, coloring books, games)
Car Kit
Keep this in the car if
possible. I used to keep a lot of
this in my car but since some of it was stolen, I keep most of it in the house
and load it up for longer trips. I
have something similar to the personal fanny pack that I keep hidden in the
jack compartment.
- 72 hour kit
- Flashlight and batteries
- Fire extinguisher
- Jumper cables
- Seat belt cutter and window breaker
(keep within reach)
- Water (bottles can go under the
seats)
- Matches
- Gloves
- Tarps
- Garbage bags
- Wipes
- Maps
- Driving compass
- Rope and/or tow strap and bungee
cords
- First aide kit (any medications)
- Siphon hose for water or gas (do
not drink gas)
- Window washer/scraper
- Crowbar and other tools (hammer,
saw, wrenches, duct tape, fuses, belts, and screws)
- Ax, bucket and shovel (this is
required in some forests)
- Engine oil
- Gas can (keep it empty and
unused unless you have a place for it on the outside of your car or truck)
Stuff you take if you have to Bug Out
This is stuff that is too heavy
to carry in your 72 hour kit but something you can throw in your car (in
addition to what is already there) quickly if you need to evacuate. You might be able to take it in a
garden cart if you can't drive but travel by roads is still safe. Here is an example to help you make
your own
kit (or here). Pack it in crates or duffle bags. Here are some suggestions (what fits in
your car will vary):
- More survival books or books on
camping/country/simple living
- 5 gallon water cans (full)
- Food (cans and other heavy bulky
items)
- Cooler (grab some ice and any
travel friendly fresh items that are still good like cheese, peanut
butter, apples, lemons, and bread)
- Large first aide kit
- Dutch oven
- Stove and fuel or barbeque,
Kelly Kettle
- Lantern (Petromax is good but
expensive)
- Unscented bleach
- Tent and large tarps, rugs
- Blanket and pillows (sleeping
pad, hammock, or cot)
- Paper plates, utensils and cups
- Paper towels and wipes
- Foil
- Solar shower
- Bucket
toilet (you can store garbage bags, toilet paper, wipes, and soap
inside the bucket)
- Many garbage bags
- Laundry soap
- Clothes pins
- Soap and shampoo
- Ant traps and insecticides
- Fishing gear
- Radio and batteries
- Several extra fuel cans (enough
to get to your destination without refueling)
- Propane
heater with fuel
- Generator
- Small safe for guns and
documents
- Bikes (on rack and with pump and
tire repair kit)
- Frisbee or other games
First Aid and Medical Kits
Take a first aide class and more
training if you can. For supplies,
the place to start is with a pre-made small portable first aide kit and a
larger home or car first aide kit.
These are usually $10 to $20 on sale (but can be $100's if you want). You can add items from your
medicine cabinet and replace things like the cheap scissors that usually come
with them. However, these usually are not good for much more than minor cuts
and scrapes (going to a hospital/doctor may not be an option or may take a
while—so do
your best until you can get to one).
For more serious injuries you probably have to make your own kit. The best book is Wilderness
Medicine, by William W. Forgey. His suggested kit in the back of the
book is great (I learned the hard way I needed some of the items that he
recommends and figure the other items are ones I may need in the future). Amazon
and Moore Medical have
most of the items if you can't find them locally. For the house or car first aide kit, I suggest a hard sided
box like a tool box. Dental care is
also important. A toothache is
really distracting. A little dental kit like this
could make you a lot more comfortable until you can see a dentist.
Other Kits
Make other kits as you see
fit. I have a kit that is mainly
in case of terrorist attack (I live and work too close to a likely
target). I have Jane's
Chem-Bio Handbook and what to do if a nuclear attack in imminent as well as Potassium Iodide (seven
days), plastic sheeting, duct tape, Tyvek clothes
coverings, and a face mask
(this is not as good as a gas mask but its what I have). You can spread this to your other kits
if you want.
Security
Protecting yourself from
criminals is as natural
as buying a fire extinguisher to put out fires (but more expensive). Get fences, dead bolts, and lock
your windows at night but if someone really wants to get in your home they
will. Police take an average of
11 minutes or more to respond to violent crimes 40 percent
of the time (sometimes hours), under normal conditions. A lot can happen
in 11 minutes and you are going to wait a lot longer in a crisis. When someone is kicking in your door,
it is too late to go buy a gun.
You are on your own.
Relying on the kindness of someone breaking into your home is not a
good bet.
If you are a gun person, pick
your own gun. This advice if for
those who don't own a gun or don't shoot.
I suggest a pistol, a rifle and a shotgun for every adult (check
you local gun laws). If I had to only have one gun it would
be a shotgun
because of their versatility. A 20
gauge shotgun is more than enough for most purposes including home
defense and has less recoil than a 12 gauge. The Remington
870 is a great choice but many people also like Mossberg. Take a class
on using the shotgun for home defense.
For home defense ammo, I use bird shot. This will not penetrate and
stop a criminal as fast as buck shot but is
also less likely to go
through a wall and hurt an innocent person. Make your own decision here based on who is in adjoining
rooms and how close the neighbors are.
You can always load bird shot as the first few shells followed by buck
shot (keep about 200 rounds on hand because it will be hard to buy in a
crisis). The only options I
recommend are hearing
protection, glasses,
a cleaning
kit, a sling
(guns with slings don't get set down in bad places as much) and maybe a light
or night sights. I think the
factory stocks are fine.
Next on my list would be a
.22. The Ruger
Single Six is a nice
revolver that is convertible to either 22 LR or 22 magnum (This might be a
better choice as the only gun for some people). Also get a holster for it. Savage and CZ make bolt
action rifles that are great bargains. A .22
is a little small for home
defense (it is less likely to stop a criminal in his tracks) but a lot
better than nothing. It is also
important to be comfortable with your gun and a .22 is fun to shoot so you are
more likely to practice
(.22 ammo is very cheap and you can get 1,000 rounds for about
$20). As soon as you are
comfortable with the .22 and your budget allows, you should probably upgrade to
a larger common caliber (.357
for a revolver, 9mm, .40 or .45 for an automatic pistol, 12 gauge for a
shotgun, and .223, .308, 7.62x39, .30-30, or .30-06 for rifles). Get a concealed weapon permit if your state
allows them even if you don't plan on using it (carrying a gun). Again, these take some time to get so
you have to get one before you need it even if you think that will be
never. Also, the required classes
are really great and focus mainly on when not to use a gun. Almost any gun range will offer such a
class (and many others that are worth it too). In general, buying a used
gun is fine (simple guns are very durable) but for the guns I recommend
here, the premium for a new gun (gun store or some sporting good stores) will
probably be less than $100 and probably worth it to avoid any mechanical issues
to start with.
Learn the gun safety rules and
locking up any guns not on your body is a good idea and a necessity if you have
kids (or adults who act like kids) in your home. For pistols you can get a cheap keyed
safe for about $20 (also good for documents). Then you have to hide the key where you can find it quickly
but no one else can. A combination
safe is better but a lot more expensive (practice opening it in the
dark). For long guns you can get a
locking
cabinet for about $100 (some cases have a good
lock and that is a good idea for taking with you in the car), put a lock on a
closet, or get a
real safe for about $1,000.
Trigger locks are generally a bad
idea because you can accidentally pull the trigger when getting them on or
off.
If you decide against a gun, at
least get pepper spray, a baseball bat, or a flashlight. A self-defense class would be good too
(martial arts classes are good but take a long time to become practical). A bullet
proof vest and helmet
would be good but neither is inexpensive.
Finally, there is safety in numbers. Staying with family and friends during a crisis is a good
idea if resources and space allow.
First Steps
- Buy some unscented bleach and start storing water.
- Start accumulating food and other supplies. Initially, just buy more of the food
that you already buy that stores well. Re-pack
as necessary. Get some food
grade buckets or plastic crates and find a cool dark place.
- Start reading more about the risks that you face personally and
ways to deal with them. What
is your plan to deal with each?
- Organize your stuff into personal mini kits, personal fanny
packs (or vests), one or more 72 hour kits for each person for each
location they spend time, a car kit, a bug out kit, and your house stash.
- Practice. This
doesn't have to be a military style exercise. Try camping and living without power and running water
(in your backyard to start with).
Load your car with what you think you would want to take if you had
to evacuate. How long did it
take? Did it all fit? Try driving back roads to get out
of town. Go hiking with your
72 hour kit.
- Periodically take an inventory and revise your plans.
Books and other sources (in order of relevance and
grouped)
Online Resources
SurvivalBlog
(the best daily variety of all types of information at a good price too)
Alpha Rubicon
(The "Mythbusters" of the survival world. Membership required for most information,
great information and more personalities than members)
Non-fiction
Fiction
Some of these are a bit
far
fetched and depressing (worst case) and mainly about TEOTWAWKI (sing “It's The
End of The World as We Know It, and I feel fine" ) (they are fiction)
but still give some good food for thought.
Author's web site: www.PrepareOrDie.com
« The Precious Metals Bull Charges Onward |Main| Note from JWR: »
Sources for Free Survival and Preparedness Information on the Internet, by K.L. in Alaska
Recent comments in SurvivalBlog provided excellent advice on using the public
library. You can gain lots of knowledge with no expense, then purchase only
those books you want to keep on hand for personal reference. Also, many colleges
and universities loan to local residents, so you can use them too, even if
you aren't a student.
If your local libraries participate, a great resource is Worldcat. It lets you search for books from home,
then go check them out, or get them through interlibrary loan.
What will happen to the Internet when the SHTF?
There's no guarantee it will survive. Even if the World Wide Web endures in
some form, most of the individual computers connected to it will not. Hopefully
by then you will have already downloaded all the free info that's going to
help you cope with the new world.
You may want to download a copy of information
on this web site or any other web site with useful content. It would be a shame
to face some disaster when all the resources of the internet are no longer
at your fingertips.
In preparation for a worst case scenario,
it's a good idea to begin now to collect the knowledge that will come in handy
later. You can download whole books, save them to jump drives, and keep an
entire library in a very small space. All kinds of free manuals, guides, tech
tips, and schematics are available on the internet; for everything from firearms
to furnaces to computers to appliances.
All of the downloads listed
here are in the public domain or allowable for copying. Stay away from sites
that may involve copyright infringement. If you use a file-sharing site such
as Limewire, Kazaa, or any site that uses bit torrents, you are not only downloading,
but also uploading. Your participation involves automatically uploading to
other users. If the file is illegal, you are distributing illegal material,
not just downloading it. Stay away from these and stick with the legitimate
sites listed below.
Keep in mind that some of this information you
download might be illegal to use at the present time. You can't practice dentistry
on your neighbor just because you have the book. Nevertheless, you have the
right to possess this very vital information. After TEOTWAWKI,
all bets are off. The information you collect today might save your life or
the life of somebody you love.
Many downloads are in Portable Document Format
(PDF) form, so to read them you must have a suitable program such as Adobe
Reader, which is the free version of Adobe Acrobat. There are alternatives
to Adobe that can read PDF files, if you prefer. Some of these files are very
large. If your internet connection is slow, it's better to right click and
download rather than try to read a huge file online.
Some documents you may want to print out. Others
you can just leave on disc. Just be sure to store your drives safely. Not included
in this list are the many web sites that are very good resources in themselves.
Rather, these are the files you can download for offline viewing at a later
time. Download them while you still can!
Project
Gutenberg was mentioned as a good place to go for eBooks.
The Smithsonian
Institution is another great resource. They have digitized many older
books, maps, and documents in their collection.
Wikisource has
a nice collection of free eBooks.
One way to search for books no longer in copyright is to use Google
Book Search. Check "full view." If it comes up in the search,
it can be downloaded as a PDF file.
A good alternative to Google is the Internet Archive which includes books,
images, audio, and more. The Internet Archive also hosts the Wayback Machine,
which archives copies of an incredible 85 billion pages from the internet of
years past.
Over 100,000 free eBooks can be accessed through Digital Book Index
2020ok is a directory of
free online books and free eBooks
The British Columbia Digital Library has an impressive Collection, including
dictionaries, encyclopedias, and most importantly, the Holy Bible. It also has a Guide to other digital libraries.
Scribd is an online document
library of free research articles, eBooks, and other content.
A great resource for home schoolers is the Internet's largest
directory of free audio & video learning resources maintained by LearnOutLoud.com.
Check out the postings of Home Schooling
On-line Resources on the The Mental Militia Forums, as well as the "Must
Have" Books/reference material topic.
More than 3,200 pages related to the U. S. Constitution can
be downloaded from The Founders' Constitution
Firearms For any
firearm you own or plan to own, you should have a drawing of its Exploded View,
which will help identify parts and how they fit together. One of the most comprehensive
collections of Exploded Views is the paper edition of the Numrich Arms Catalog, which
in itself is a gold mine of information and very inexpensive for a volume of
over 1200 pages.
But if you only need certain Exploded Views, there are many
places on the internet where you can download them for free:
Gunuts is a good place
to start with hundreds of drawings. Another source is The Okie Gunsmith Shop, which
is apparently no longer operating, but you can still download drawings and
parts lists from its web site.Big Bear Gun Works has
another good list. For pre-WWII firearms, check out Gunsworld. For examples of specific
firearms manufacturers, see Remington, Browning, and SKB Shotguns
The book, The Defensive Use Of Firearms by
Shane C. Henry is available as a download from rec.guns. An enormous amount
of additional gun information is available on the rec.guns web site.
There are several good sources for Military Publications: GlobalSecurity.org has
a huge collection of Military manuals.
Try Integrated Publishing for
access to millions of pages of engineering manuals and documents.
The U.S. Army Materiel Command maintains the LOGSA web site for access
to thousands of Army technical manuals.
The U.S. Air Force maintains the Air Force e-Publishing web site.
As mentioned recently, The
Small Wars Journal has a Reference
Library of downloadable military documents.
The Brooke Clarke
web site has a good guide to accessing military field manuals
Surviving War and Nuclear
Attack For a basic guide, download How
To Survive A Chemical Or Biological Attack.
Nuclear War Survival
Skills, along with some other very interesting books, can be found on
the Oregon
Institute of Science and Medicine web site. This book includes plans
for the Kearny Fallout Radiation Meter (KFM). If you have not bought a radiation
meter, you should at least download the book for future reference. You can
also get the Free
Plans from The Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Nuclear War Survival Skills is also available on the KI4U web site as an online
book, but not as a download.
The Equipped To Survive web site
has some free ebooks, as well as books for sale: Survival,
Evasion, and Recovery and U.S. Army Survival Manual FM 21-76.
The Volunteer Center of Marin County, California has prepared A Guide to Organizing
Neighborhoods for Preparedness, Response and Recovery which you
can copy from their web site.
Medical Resources The Disease
Net has a library of downloadable manuals on survival, weapons, emergency
medicine, and less serious subjects.
Virtual Naval Hospital is
a digital library of naval, military, and humanitarian medicine
The very important field manual, First Aid For Soldiers FM 21-11 can be downloaded here.
One of the best medical handbooks available is the U.S. Army Special Forces Medical Handbook ST31-91B.
It can be downloaded free (as well as additional essential guides) from Delta Gear, Inc.
A newer version of the Medical
Handbook, plus more great material can be downloaded from NH-TEMS
(New Hampshire Tactical Emergency medical support).
The
American Red Cross has some of their disaster guides online for download.
For most of their material, you have to go to the local office. Some of it
can be copied from the Earth
Changes Media Survival Tips page.
The Red Cross Book, First
Aid in Armed Conflicts and Other Situations of Violence
The UK Maritime and Coastguard Agency book, The
Ship Captain's Medical Guide
Hesperian makes
available free downloads of its books for medical treatment in primitive conditions.
Two highly respected guides it publishes are Where There Is No Doctor and Where
There Is No Dentist.
Here is a direct link to the must-have book Survival and
Austere Medicine: An introduction. Australian Survivalist Online
has several additional Files
for downloading.
The Department of Agriculture has
a treasure trove of information for free download. This agency maintains The
National Agricultural Library, a collection of free information on Agriculture,
Food and Nutrition, and other related subjects.
Another USDA web site is the Cooperative Extension
Service. Click on the map to navigate to various Extension offices around
the country. Don't limit your search to just your own state. Many of them
have invaluable information on animals, crops, construction, food preparation
and much more for free download.
The
USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) offers downloads about preventing plant and animal diseases,
among other topics.
The USDA Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) offers Fact
Sheets about food handling and preparation, and emergency preparedness.
Other Important Reference
Resources The classic outdoor guides, The 10
Bushcraft Books by Richard Graves are available on the Chris Molloy web
site. Free manuals for electronic equipment can be downloaded from eServiceInfo.com. Another source is UsersManualGuide.com. For Ham Radio
and Test Equipment Manuals, the KO4BB web site has Free Downloads, as well as LINKS to many other web sites with free downloads. A few examples
of repair information for outdoor equipment are Penn Reel Schematics,
and Mercury outboard
parts.
Paid Services In
the unlikely event that you can't find free information on the Net to fix that
generator or whatever you need to repair, there are web sites that charge for
information. As a last resort, you can check Sam's PHOTOFACT service manuals,
or RepairManual.com. Hopefully,
that won't be necessary.
The foregoing just begins to scratch the surface. Some of
these free downloads are also available as books or CDs from eBay, Amazon or
from some of the survivalist web sites. That is fine. Sometimes it is easier
to just pay the money and buy the book. But nobody can afford it all, and downloading
gives you access to millions of pages - much more knowledge than you could
acquire through any other method.
« Letter Re: A Twenty-Something EMT with Limited Preps Storage Space |Main| Note from JWR: »
Letter Re: Retreat Security--Lessons Learned from the Rhodesian Experience
Jim:
After giving it some thought [to post-TEOTWAWKI retreat
security], I think we need to study many of the homestead/farmstead fortifications
used during
the [late 1970s] Rhodesian
Bush
War and
to a certain extend in
rural South Africa in the present day. Of course, one would need to adjust
for legalities so one would not be breaking any laws. - Lame Wolf
[JWR Adds: Lame Wolf also sent us a great quote from a
letter by "Rhodesian" that was first posted at the Small Wars Journal
(SWJ) web site. BTW I recommend the SWJ site--in particular their Reference
Library pages--as a research tool for anyone seeking insight on retreat
security and living in turbulent
times.]:
Rhodesian Farmers Defensive Arrangements
At every farm, defensive arrangements were made up to suit their particular
situation and infrastructure. The following would be a general overview:
1) Most farmers fitted hand-grenade grills to the outside of all windows. Doors
leading outside were likewise security grilled.
2) Many farmers built thick walls about a meter in front of bedroom windows
to stop bullets, but particularly to deal with RPG-7s. Beds were never placed
against the outside walls of a farmhouse.
3) It was usual to have a designated safe room within the farmhouse that could
be defended until support arrived. Sometimes this was a central corridor that
allowed the farmer to move into other rooms to attack those outside through
the windows. In the loft or ceiling over the safe room, some farmers laid sand
bags to deal with possible mortar attack.
4) Every farmhouse in a given area was linked by a radio system called “Agric
Alert”. This allowed radio contact with other farmers who formed their
own defence units, usually under the umbrella of PATU (Police Anti-Terrorist
Unit), which would react to a call from one of their neighbours for assistance.
Another means of alarm raising was the use of a signal rocket - The Agric-Alert
system was not done away with after the war, such was the lack of trust in
Mugabe`s promises. It performed admirably as well when dealing with criminal
activity such as stock theft. The alert system arranged for all farmers to
check in with each other at a given time in the morning and evening as a means
of monitoring their status.
5) Around all farmhouse gardens were erected security fences with barbed wire
(or razor wire) and which often had simple alarm systems built into them. Some
I believe were electrified, if not before the end of the war, certainly afterwards.
Within the fence boundary, every farmer usually had a couple of large dogs.
The dogs were fed their largest meal in the morning instead of the evening,
in order to help keep them awake at night. Other farmers had geese or ducks,
which made excellent guard “dogs.” Gardens were kept deliberately
trim so as to keep clear fields of view and fire etc. The farm houses also
had outside flood lighting erected in such a way as to blind those outside
the fence, but not to interfere with the vision of those within the farmhouse.
6) All farmers and their wives were armed with an assortment of weapons, and
most farmers were trained military men. They had at least one assault rifle,
usually an FAL 7.62, assorted shot guns, .303 hunting rifles and so forth.
It was also not unusual for wives to carry Uzi`s around with them, or other
equivalents such as the Rhodesian Cobra. All members of the family were trained
on the various weaponry available to them, including the kids. In one famous
incident a child successfully fought off the attacking terrorists after both
of his parents were wounded. The main defensive weapons were at all times within
immediate reach of the adult farmhouse occupants, and were placed next to the
bed at night.
7) Some farmers used mine protected vehicles, as a favourite of terrorists
was to landmine the driveway outside the fence. A great deal of time was spent
looking at the dirt roads for freshly dug earth points and so forth when driving
around the farm.
8) Some farm gardens and particular points external to the fence were wired
with home-made claymore like devices strategically placed in areas where attackers
were likely to take cover. In a few instances farmers deliberately erected “cover
positions” for the terrorists to use outside the fence, which were then
blown up upon attack. A particular favourite was a section of plastic piping
filled with nails, nuts, bolts, screws and so forth. I witnessed tests with
these and the tubes cleared large areas of their intended aiming point of all
bush cover and leaves from trees etc for about 30 meters into the bush. By
placing a number of figure 8`s in front of these tests, it was apparent from
the strike patterns that not one of them would have walked again had they been
terrorists.
9) Some farmers also hired soldiers on leave to guard their premises at night.
Usually these were men looking for extra beer money. They were
called Bright Lights [referring to the bright lights of Salisbury, the nation's
capitol, since most of these were "city boys"], and often ended up
in fire fights with the terrorists, where they came as a
nasty
surprise
to
the
terrs
when
the latter
were expecting
a nice soft hit and run. Like all farmers in an area, Bright Lights would participate
in the support of other farmers when the situation required.
10) Good relationships with farm labour, particularly the house staff, very
often warned of problems before they occurred. All of us who grew up in the
country have fond memories of those employees who took care of us as kids,
and who often placed themselves at great risk for doing so.
« Letter Re: Comments on the Movie "I Am Legend" |Main| Moon Bounce Communications, by David in Israel »
Letter Re: Coleman Fuel--Uses and Storage Life
Hi Jim,
According to Coleman's web site, Coleman
fuel can be stored for 5 to
7 years. I wondered if a chainsaw with the correct oil additive run
on Coleman fuel. So I did a web search, and this is what I found, over at the
Timebomb 2000 (Y2K) Discussion Forums, posted back in 1998] - E.L.:
Coleman Fuel the Final Word!
Boy What did I start? I have seen more rumors and half truths about Coleman
fuel since I posted that it did work on engines!! Coleman fuel is a very
highly refined version of gasoline! It has no additives
in it. It comes in sealed metal cans and it stores at least five years if
you keep it cool and leave it alone til you use it! It will
work in all gasoline engines! You mix oil in 2 cycle [engine]s so that is
not a problem. In 4 cycle add 1/2 to 1 oz of ATF or
Marvel Mystery Oil per gallon of fuel to provide top cylinder lube. If you
want to go one step further get some lead substitute for the old regular
burning engines. Okay?
Now I am going to provide you with a very basic primer on
how oil and fuel relate to the cracking (refining) tower. crude oil in:[the]
lowest [fractioning] levels give you motor oils then fuel oils. Here is how
it is,, [from] top to bottom:
LPG (Much
more done to refine but you get the idea), white gasoline, Racing gas, Avgas,
Gasoline, K1 kerosene, kerosene fuel oil, #1 fuel oil, #2 fuel oil, #3
fuel oil, # 4 motor oils. Okay, now there are many other products made
at various levels and many other additives are introduced to provide the
end
products we use but this gives you an Idea as to how the various fuels
relate.
Now if you want to store some Coleman fuel for emergency use, then go
ahead, do it! If it burns gas it will burn Coleman! But if you want
to use it try it now! Don't wait to see if it will work, don't
post over and over and over.Try it out for yourself!!! But
don't plan on it being your primary fuel. You can't possibly
store enough [in one gallon cans] to run generators on it. Most of you have no
clue as to how much fuel a gasoline generator really uses. Running
a typical gas generator would run you at least 5 gallons per day, every day,
assuming you only ran it 5-6 hours per day! Do the math! Store 20 gallons [of
Coleman fuel] for your chainsaw. Another 10 for the log splitter. But that's
about it. if you need to use some for another reason for a short term use go
ahead! But if your looking for long term continuous use get
a diesel car, truck, generator, or whatever. - Rich H.
« Letter Re: Solar Ovens |Main| Note from JWR: »
Your Life in Your Pocket by John T.
A significant part of being prepared and being able to weather a crisis is
having information. Remember, those in charge now will make it their first
priority after TSHTF to
return to the status quo. Banks and mortgage companies will do everything possible
to continue banking and lending. Landlords will do whatever it takes to make
sure they continue to collect rent from their tenants, and any police or military
personnel you come into contact with will be very unhappy if you cannot prove
who you are or otherwise deflect suspicion.
You can call having critical information available during and after a crisis "life
continuity." There are three aspects to it: collection, protection, and
dispersion.
The first step is collection. Just as with other aspects of your survival
plan, you'll want to make a list of the information you want to collect and
have available during and after a crisis. Such a list should include:
- medical information and records for all family members
- names, addresses, and contact numbers of relatives, doctors and insurance
companies
- copies of wills, living trusts, powers of attorney, and other legal documents
- copies of insurance policies
- copies of birth certificates, wedding licenses, children's school records,
and college transcripts
- copies of property ownership documents, such as mortgage agreements and property
deeds
- copies of driver licenses and passports
- e-books or scanned pages from knowledge materials you've collected
- as many family photos as you feel you need, but at a minimum make sure there
is a clear "head shot" of everyone in your family that can be used
by authorities if needed to conduct a search
- video taped walk-throughs of your house and property showing major purchases
and valuables and the condition of any buildings
While some of the items above might seem like overkill, it is important to
remember that you can never have enough supporting documentation if you ever
need to prove your case or prove your identity. Imagine bugging out of your
home and going to your retreat for three months, only to return to your home
after the all clear to find it occupied by squatters. Will you be able to prove
the house is yours? If your insurance company denies your claim, will you have
the materials ready to counter their argument in your appeal?
Once you've collected the documents and photos, the next step is protection.
At a minimum, you'll want to have a fireproof box or safe to hold your documents.
Even better, get a box or safe that is waterproof as well. For example, Sentry
makes a small waterproof and fireproof lockbox for well under $100. You might
even be able to pick one up for much less at a garage sale or flea market.
Put your safe in an obscure location in your home, and use any supplied mounting
hardware to mount the safe to the floor or wall to prevent thieves from simply
lifting it up and walking away with it. Avoid any safe or lockbox that requires
power to operate, such as batteries or a wall plug. This includes the fancy
safes with biometric access mechanisms. You don't need Fort Knox; you just
need to be reasonably protected. If you can't afford a lockbox or safe, at
least put your document stash into a large Ziploc bag and put it somewhere
safe. You could put it into a locking file cabinet or even put it into a five-gallon
pail and bury it.
Dispersion is another key element to protecting your information stash. Make
copies of everything and mail a set to your lawyer and a couple sets to trusted
family members. Mailing a set to family outside of your region is an especially
good idea. For example, if you live in the Midwest, you would want to send
a copy to someone on the east coast or perhaps out west. Use a service with
a tracking number that requires a signature so that you can be sure the documents
arrive at their location. Even better is to scan everything into an electronic
format. PDF is
best, as it can be read on just about any computer. Take the electronic copies
and write them to a CD or DVD, also known as "burning to disk" since
the CD/DVD drive's laser actually burns information into the disk. CD and DVD
writers are very cheap nowadays, on the order of $20-$30 for a brand new unit
and a few dollars for the disk media. Keep a couple copies along with your
paper (hard) copies, and send out a DVD to your family members instead of a
large pack of documents.
Some people also keep electronic copies of their important documents on USB keys.
USB keys are also known as "thumb drives" because of their size.
Any computer with a USB port can access a USB key as if it was a hard drive.
Keep in mind, though, that a USB key is electronic and will be susceptible
to anything that would damage electronics such as a magnetic field. While it
might not seem like a good idea to keep important info on something that could
end up damaged, the point is to analyze the trade-off between convenience and
accessibility without hurting reliability. If you have hard copies of everything,
then using something as convenient as a USB key might be an advantage. For
example, you could hook the USB key to your belt and walk into a disaster relief
shelter to use the computer there instead of walking around with a big pack
of important papers.
If you choose to make electronic copies of your information, you will want
to encrypt everything and make sure to use innocent-sounding labels. Imagine
sending a DVD labeled "Our Family's Important Information" to someone
on the other side of the country. If that DVD were to fall into the wrong hands,
those people would have everything they needed to steal your identity. Instead,
label the CD or DVD something like "Our Family Vacation 2006" where "2006" is
the year that the DVD was made. That way you will know which is the most recent.
Encrypting your information sounds difficult, but it is actually pretty easy.
The only downside is that you will need a computer to decrypt the information
once it is encrypted. There are numerous free and open encryption programs
available at no charge. My favorite is called TrueCrypt. How it works is beyond
the scope of this article, but it is safe to say that if you encrypt your information
with TrueCrypt, it would take all the computers in the world several hundreds
of years to crack it. TrueCrypt runs on Windows computers only, but similar
applications are available for Mac OS X and Linux.
If you are technically savvy and really want to take your USB key to the next
level, you can install a complete operating system onto the USB key itself.
An example would be PenDrive
Linux or Damn Small
Linux. Damn Small Linux is only 50 MB in size!
With the OS right on your USB key, you could keep all your information encrypted
and never have to worry about what type of computer you would need to decrypt
and view your information.
Many people focus on the tangible aspects of being prepared. Beans, bandages
and bullets are important, but so are intangibles like information. With a
small amount of effort and little to no expenses, you can make sure all the
information your family might need to survive, regroup, and move on is protected
and in an easily-accessible and safe location.
« Two Letters Re: Seeking Advice on Swimming Pool Chlorine for Treating Drinking Water |Main| Notes from JWR: »
Disaster Proof Your Home, by "Decay"
In today’s survival forums much emphasis is placed on issues such as
Bug Out Bags (BOBs), Main Battle Rifles, or Bug Out Vehicles (BOVs) These
are important but I feel that it is critical that we also remember to return
to
the basics
in
an
emergency
situation.
It was through my neighborhood Emergency Training program that I was reminded
how fragile our homes, apartments, and neighborhoods can be during and after
a disaster. Before flooding, hurricanes, tornados, famine, pestilence, plague,
war or martial law. You and your family should get prepared so that you will
be ready for anything that rolls down the pipe! The basic eight in your home
are: gas & propane, water, structure, communication, light, food, and first
aid.
WATER & NATURAL GAS/PROPANE: A four-in-one tool can
be used to shut off gas and water lines, turn off main lines to your home/apartment.
Water heaters should be strapped to the nearest wall, in case of an earthquake.
By shutting off your water, you will not waste water pressure to the fire hydrants.
ELECTRIC: Get familiar with the location of your main power
switch so that you can turn off all of the power to your home in the case of
emergency. Remember that the power company will be receiving thousands of service
requests during an emergency and will not be available to respond quickly to
them. By knowing how to turn off the power quickly you will reduce the risk
of electrocution and fire in your home.
STRUCTURE:
- If your domicile is damaged beyond repair and is not livable, have a tent
or Geodesic dome handy where your family can live until a new structure can
be rebuilt.
- If you live in area that is prone to wildfires, you will need a 100 yard
radius around you home that is limits flammable materials, including
shrubbery and trees. [See: this
site on "defensive
space" for your property.]
- Sand bags are important for flood prone areas, and be used as a safe room,
bunker, or to cover windows to stop incoming rounds. Single stacked sand
bags will stop 7.62x51 [NATO] rounds.
- Chainsaws will be handy for cutting down branches/trees after a windstorm,
ice storm, tornado or hurricane.
- Heavy curtains placed over windows will help protect you and your family
from falling glass in earthquake prone areas.
- Installing anti-tilt brackets on furniture and bookshelves will also prevent
injury from falling objects.
- Constructing a concrete storm shelter will keep your family alive in hurricane
and tornado prone areas. It should be below ground level and connect to your
house basement, if possible. Food, water, blankets, first aid kits and cots
should be stored in in the basement.
COMMUNICATION: Battery-powered SW/AM/FM/Weather band
radio. Store it without the batteries installed. [Store your radio in a metal
ammo can] in case of EMP.
LIGHT: Small flashlights next to every family member's nightstand
will help guide them around or out of the house in a power outage or disaster.
Also remember to keep a flashlight next to the power junction box to replace
blown fuses.
FIRST AID: Two first aid kits should be available in the
home. One can be kept in the home and the other should be in your jump kit
or backpack to take with you in the case of evacuation. These kits should be
organized and easy to find so that first aid items can be accessed and used
quickly. Check and refill your kits on a yearly basis. Burn gels, Betadine
and other creams and dry out and over-the-counter pain killers will expire.
Remember to have a three month supply on prescription drugs in both kits.
FOOD: Last but not least, it is important to remember that
we need to build our food pantries so that in the case of emergency we have
enough food to survive for at least two months. This includes storing good
drinking water that is safe from contamination.
« Letter Re: Masonry Stoves / Brick Ovens |Main| Jim's Quote of the Day: »
SurvivalBlog Reader Poll: What is Your Profession?
I'm amazed at the wide variety of people that read SurvivalBlog. I"m
starting a new poll: in seven words or less, tell us you profession,
(via e-mail) and I will post an anonymous
list. For any of you that are doctors, lawyers, or engineers, and so forth
please state your specialty. If you have two (or more) vocations,
please state the both with a slash in between. (Such as "neurosurgeon / musician.")
As standard policy, unless specifically given permission I remove people's
names, titles, e-mail addresses, company names, and other identifiers from
letters
before
I post them. Without mentioning any names,
let me briefly summarize some the more notable readers that I already know
about: NASA scientists, Lawrence National Laboratories physicists, pharmacists,
doctors in various specialties, Hollywood actors, foundry workers, novelists,
a rock-'n- roll musician, dojo masters, current and former military intelligence officers,
NSA intelligence
analysts, stock analysts, derivatives traders, aircraft mechanics, an astronaut,
beekeepers, military and civilian pilots (lots!), submariners, an underwater
welder, veterinarians--including
one that is also an attorney, a prototype automobile modeler in Detroit, real
estate agents, truckers, organic farmers, a mushroom farmer, two fish farmers,
research chemists, an underwater photographer, U.S. Army Special Forces officers
and NCOs, Navy SEALs, petroleum engineers, umpteen electrical and computer
engineers,
and dozens of police officers, paramedics, and firemen. I'll be interested
to see what a more complete list looks like!
« Odds 'n Sods: |Main| Note from JWR: »
Fuel Storage for Survival Retreats, by Flighter
The world runs on petroleum. Imagine a post-apocalyptic period when
the local gas station is closed, and has been for two years. How
will you carry out your daily activities? Generate electricity? Pump
water? Plow your garden, or fields? All of these can be done by hand,
and have been for thousands of years. Modern life has given us tools
to help with these chores, and we can store the tools, and the food
for them, for quite awhile. Gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, kerosene,
Coleman® fuel, and other petroleum products – all can
be stored.
For long term survival purposes, only one vehicle fuel is worth talking
about: Diesel.
Why pick diesel fuel? Simply, because it stores so much better than
gasoline. It offers better mileage in similar vehicles than gasoline
would (so you get more bang for the storage volume).
Diesel engines are inherently more reliable and getting 200K miles
or more from a diesel engine isn’t at all unusual. For example:
our daily driver car is a 1982 Mercedes 300D Turbo, that has almost
400K miles on it. The only maintenance the engine has gotten (besides
fuel and oil filters) is cleaning the fuel injectors (a simple, DIY job)
and the injector pump has been rebuilt and timed. The transmission
did have to be rebuilt at around 300K miles, I’m not sure why.
Diesel fuel is also far safer to store than gasoline is. It rarely
forms explosive vapors like gasoline will, and it has a knack of finding
any pinhole or loose fitting to leak out of, so you can find the leaks
and stop them before they get bad.
It’s also possible to make your own diesel fuel from waste cooking
oil (like from a restaurant), or oil from crops like soybeans, that
you might be able to grow yourself. The process of making biodiesel
isn’t hard, you just need some equipment and inexpensive chemicals
on hand.
For those who live in areas where homes are still heated with heating
oil, you can use that (or farm [untaxed off-road] diesel) in your vehicles
in an emergency. Don’t use it in a road vehicle until it is an
emergency, or you can get into tax troubles. If you’re planning
on scavenging for heating oil, a 12 VDC electric pump, with a good
filter (like another
diesel engine fuel filter) on the discharge side into your storage
containers. Water and fungus will grow in poorly maintained (heating
oil) tanks and gum up your engine. Filters are relatively cheap now,
get them and store them.
Unfortunately, diesel engines have to be heavy, so they don’t
lend themselves to smaller engines like for chainsaws, or similar appliances.
About the smallest sized diesel generator is 2Kva, too and it’s
not easily portable. So, in addition to diesel, it may be necessary
to store gasoline (and maybe kerosene) as well.
Storing fuel:
Whatever kind of fuel you want to store, it’s best to check and
find out the local (town, county, state) laws on storing fuel. Environmental
concerns these days make it hard to store legally, so it’s best
to find out what you can legally do before the state moves in and does
an ‘environmental cleanup’ that you will have to pay for.
These cleanups routinely exceed 5 figures in cost, and unless you specifically
have insurance for it, your insurance probably won’t cover it.
For these reasons, storing fuel above ground is usually easier than
in below ground tanks. When I decided to get a large tank for diesel,
I purchased a surplus airport refueling vehicle with a 5,000 gallon
tank, rather than try and get a permit for a 5,000 gallon tank. Also,
you should check with your insurance carrier to see if there are any
limitations on the quantity of fuel you can store.
Storing fuel in any quantity can be dangerous, and should be done safely.
If you don’t have a detached structure to store fuel in, I’d
recommend not storing any in the house – get a garden shed or
something. We have a fenced-in area (about the size of a dog run) with
a simple roof of corrugated metal, to keep the worst of the sun and
weather off the cans. Paint your above ground tanks white to help keep
them cool in the summer, and reduce evaporative loss. The tanks should
also have seals that are in good condition, to avoid water from rainstorms
getting in.
And since fuel is flammable, keep a couple of big fire extinguishers
nearby (but not in) where you keep the fuel. I’d suggest at least
two, 20 lb dry chemical extinguishers, with a rating of at least 60B:C.
These are not the usual type of home fire extinguishers, which are
too small for the quantities of fuel that might be involved.
Whatever you store, you need to make sure that it’s stabilized
for long term use. There are at least two products to stabilize fuel,
one called “Sta-bil” and another called “Pri-“,
with different versions for gasoline and diesel fuel. Most people consider
the Pri- products to be superior, [but] the Sta-bil is easier to find.
I’d
recommend getting a supply of Pri on hand. In addition to stabilizing
diesel fuel for long term use, it works pretty well at restoring old,
non-stabilized diesel fuel. See the PRI
Products and Sta-Bil web
sites.
All fuel (gas, diesel, jet, whatever) will collect water in
the tanks, from condensation. The water will allow bacteria and fungus
to grow,
if not kept in check. Pri (and others) make a bactericide that you
can use to keep the bacteria from growing. Stock up on it, too.
Whatever fuel you store, you should have different sizes of containers
of them – I keep 2-1/2, and 5 gallon fuel cans, 55 gallon steel
drums (filled only to 50 gallons), and larger tanks. The assortment
of sizes lets me move fuel in the quantities I need, or to share. The
steel containers need to be grounded while they’re in storage,
to prevent a stray static electrical spark from causing an explosion.
I also keep the smaller containers up off the ground by using wooden
pallets, to help cut down on rust. I wind up cleaning and painting
a few every year, to keep them from rusting too badly.
All of our vehicles are diesel powered. The only gasoline requirements
we have are for things like chainsaws, and for ATVs and snowmobiles.
We store liquid fuels in a variety of containers, including 55-gallon
drums (filled to only 50 gallons for gas, 52 for diesel, because fuel
will expand when it warms up, in a couple of farm tanks (medium sized
tanks on stands), 5 gallon military fuel cans, plastic fuel cans, 5-gallon
metal square cans (which store better than the round ones), almost
any kind of container that’s intended for fuel will do. It’s
easier to refill the chain saws and similar tools from smaller containers
than the large ones, and it’s not too hard to refill the 2-1/2
gallon containers from the 5 gallon cans, or the large farm tank, or
at the gas station. The stored fuel gets stabilized when we refill
the big tank, and once a year, with Pri.
To move all that fuel around, I have two AC electrical pumps, two DC
electrical pumps, and two hand pumps. The AC electrical pumps are explosion
proof, and are connected to the farm tanks with a water separator/filter
on the discharge hose. The hose has a nozzle just like at the gas station,
and we have some drip pans (made out of the cut-off ends of steel drums)
to catch anything that drips. We don’t have a meter, we keep
track of about how much we pump on a log sheet. The DC pumps connect
to the vehicle batteries, and can be used to move fuel from any source
to any tank, and have strainers and filters on them. One is for gas,
and one for diesel, of course.
For the fuel drums, you should get a legitimate bung wrench to safely
remove and replace the bungs (hole caps). These aren’t too expensive,
and handle both sizes (large and small). [They are available from Northern
Tool & Equipment.] You
can get by with regular hand tools but it’s harder, and you can
damage the drum. You should either keep the drums stored on their sides
(with
the bungs
horizontal), or at the very least keep a cover on top of the end of
the drum (there are made from plastic specifically for this purpose)
to keep water from pooling on the top from rain, which will get sucked
into even a sealed drum (through the bung).
Once you have drums, or large tanks, how do you fill them? There are
a couple of ways, you can buy fuel at the gas station in 5 gallon containers
and transfer them, or you can put a drum in the back of your pickup
truck and fill it at the gas station. I have found that if you can
find a commercial fuel distributor they will deliver, if you order
more than a few hundred gallons. They send out a smaller fuel truck
(not a semi) and charge you about the going price for fuel. Once you
have a very large tank (for the farm/ranch, you know) you can get a
good discount. I paid about 20% less than the going price to fill my
large diesel tank. In order to do this, however, you have to have a
good enough driveway and access for the truck to get to the tanks.
Finally, there’s one more way to get fuel: If you have a large
tank in your truck, you can fill it up at the gas station, and pump
it out at home. Repeat as necessary. The advantage with this is that
nobody will know that you have fuel storage at home, the downside is
the cost, because you will be paying top dollar for the fuel. And,
you have to switch around to different gas stations, going into the
same station every day for a week and buying 75 or 100 gallons of fuel
might make someone suspicious.
The farm tanks, explosion proof pumps, hoses, nozzles, fuel filters,
bung wrenches, and all the rest of the specialty equipment I mention
is commonly available from farm supply places, home centers, or industrial
supply companies. One good company to deal with is Northern
Tool & Equipment
How to ground large tanks:
First of all, you need a good ground point. The easiest way to ground
is to buy a copper-clad steel grounding rod at the home center, they’re
usually 8’ long. You pick a location (near your fuel storage
area, which of course should be away from anything that might burn)
and drive it into the ground, all the way (start on a ladder, obviously).
All it takes is time and a big hammer.
The grounding cables can be made out of old welding cables, large gauge
wire (at least 4 AWG, anything else will break pretty quickly, and
won’t withstand a lightning strike), or what the military uses
for grounding drums, 3/16” diameter, nylon or plastic coated
stainless steel cable, available at the home center or farm supply.
Attach the grounding cable to the grounding rod with a permanent clamp,
and then with alligator or battery clips, get clipped onto each metal
container, on bare metal. It’s okay to have more than one clamp
on a cable, just make sure (with an ohm meter, available for under
$10 at Radio Shack) that you have less than a couple (3-4 ohms) resistance
from the furthest end of the cable to the grounding rod. If your resistance
is more than that, clean off the connections of all the wire pieces
and try again.
NOTE: It’s not a good idea to use your home grounding point for
the fuel ground, first of all it’s probably too close to the
house, and secondly you can get into issues with ground loop currents
and other violations of the National Electrical Code – not a
law, just a good idea (usually) to follow.
Wood
If you have a fireplace, or wood burning stoves (either for cooking,
or warmth), you’ll need wood. You can cut your own, or buy it,
or both. By the way, I don’t recommend reliance on a pellet or
corn stove. They require power, and pellets (or corn), and unless you
can grow enough corn to feed them, they’re just unreliable. Even
if you can grow enough corn, they still require power.
Buying wood (rather than cutting it yourself) has some advantages.
You don’t have to do the work, for one. Cutting and splitting
wood, then stacking it to dry, then stacking it again when dry, and
moving it, all are a workout. When you buy it you can usually get it
stacked where you want (perhaps for a small extra fee).
At any rate, you should store the wood under cover, to help keep it
dry. A pile of wood with a blue plastic tarp over it isn’t going
to stay dry long. The tarp will rip in the first breeze, and they don’t
last long exposed to sunlight. If possible, build a wood shed or lean-to
that’s near where you will need the wood so you don’t have
to haul it too far. It doesn’t have to be completely weather-tight,
but if possible it should have a concrete or rock foundation, and enough
on the sides and top to keep the wood mostly dry. Your wood storage
shouldn’t be attached to the house, insects will be in the stored
wood, and you don’t want them attacking your house.
How much wood to store depends on how much you use a winter, how much
room you have, and how much you want to store. The type of wood matters
too, each type of wood has different energy values. Use what you can
get. We have a very energy efficient house, and only use about two
cords a year. A cord is a pile of split wood that’s 4 feet high
and wide, and 8 feet long. The wood in the pile is supposed to be stacked
"loose enough for a rat to run through, but not so loose that
the cat chasing it can."
Oftentimes vendors will try and sell you a pile that’s 4x8’,
but only of 16” (or smaller) pieces, this is not a real cord;
sometimes it’s called a ‘face’ cord. Adjust the price
accordingly, and shop around. I like to keep at least two years supply
of wood on hand (to allow for an especially bad winter, and since we
have a wood cook stove that we could use in the kitchen, to feed it).
In reality, I have about 10 cords of wood on hand right now, in three
sheds. Since the price doesn’t seem to go down much, it’s
not a bad investment.
I actually cut some of the wood myself (check with your local forests
to see if you can get a permit), it’s good exercise. It’s
nice to know how to cut a tree with hand tools, then limb it (cut the
limbs off), buck it (cut it into smaller sections), and finally cut
and split it to length (usually less than 16” for the stoves,
somewhat larger for fireplaces) but it’s a lot of
work. I know how, and have the tools to do it put away, but once I
learned, I decided
to use power tools. Even so, cutting and splitting with power tools
is still a pretty good workout.
Using powered or hand tools to cut wood are dangerous. You should get
trained by a pro, and be careful. Be sure to get all the protective
equipment, including Kevlar chaps, a hard hat with face and eye guards,
and hearing protection, and gloves. Follow all the other safety recommendations
as well. If you’re going to use powered cutting tools, stock
up on spares like chainsaw chains, 2-stroke oil, bar grease, a sharpening
guide (and files), etc. If you really want to get serious with crosscut
timber saws, get a kerf setter, too (kerf is the degree that the saw
teeth bend out from the saw, to prevent binding. It has to be reset
from time to time).
Propane
If you live in an area where propane is used for cooking or heat, you
will have (most likely) a white “sausage” tank outside.
These come in different sizes, but 500 to maybe 1,000 gallons are common
for homes. Larger tanks are available, you can buy them from individuals
but the propane companies will want the tanks pressure tested and certified
before they fill them, or they will sell you (or lease you) a tank.
Shop around. Usually at least two companies that serve an area. Play
them against each other to get the biggest tank you can, filled for
as little as possible). By the way, the propane company will probably
want the propane tanks grounded, or they may consider the pipe going
to the house sufficient. Personally, I’d put in another grounding
rod.
I have two tanks, one for each company in the area, both plumbed to
the house with shutoff valves. This allows me to fill up the tank from
the company that’s charging the least each year, and worked a
deal where I lease the tank for $1 per year from them. My tanks are
far enough away from everything that should they explode it’s
not that risky, but I still have them surrounded by a chain link fence,
and have a berm around them (to hide them, when they ask…the
berm has grass and flowers on it). This provides a little protection
should one ever blow, they’re also on opposite sides of my property
so if one goes, the other won’t.
We also have a couple of travel trailers, which have their own propane
bottles; and a number of smaller (20#) tanks. Propane will last forever,
so storing it isn’t hard – just keep the bottles out of
the way, and closed.
Other fuels and petroleum products
Since we have some kerosene lamps and a kerosene space heater, we store
about 50 gallons of kerosene in 5-gallon cans. Our Coleman camping
stoves are all white gas models (with propane conversions, a great
thing to do, cheap, you can use bulk tanks or disposable canisters,
and the conversion is cheap and lets you switch back and forth) so
we also have around 25 gallons of Coleman-type fuel (naphtha).
It’s not strictly fuel, but of course I store engine oil and
lubricants for the vehicles, paint thinner, solvents, gun lubes and
cleaners, etc. They are kept in original containers until I move them
to the garage, gun room, etc. The 3 trucks each use more than 3 gallons
of oil (each) at each change so I try and buy larger (1-, or 5-gallon)
containers of oil, rather than 1 qt containers. They get stored in
the covered shed.
Finally, since I do some engine maintenance around the house, I sometimes
have waste oil and fuel to dispose of. I have a 50-gallon drum that
is dedicated to this waste fuel role, and some 5 gallon cans (the ones
that have previously held kerosene or engine oil are great for this).
I can fill up the 50 gallon waste drum and then pump out smaller quantities
of
waste
oil to burn in a waste oil heater in the winter time, or to take to
town to get rid of in an approved dump.
« Odds 'n Sods: |Main| Letter Re: Some Useful British Survival Web Sites »
Three Letters Re: Bullet Casting: A (Relatively) Simple Introduction, by AVL
Hi Jim,
I have two notes regarding casting your own bullets (or any other
metal for that matter): First: One piece of safety equipment that
you really should have on hand when casting any metal is dry sand.
Make sure you have at least 25 pounds of dry sand at the
ready. If there is a metal spill, dump the sand on it
and it will contain the flow and cool it quickly, plus it will
cut of the supply of
oxygen, preventing fire.
Second: A fire extinguisher is good to have to put out fires, but
with molten metal flowing all over the place lighting things on fire,
a fire extinguisher is not enough. You must never put water on molten
metal, because it will cause a steam explosion. This will burn you,
and send splatters of molten metal flying all over the place making
your problems much worse. Choose a dry chemical fire extinguisher
that is rated to be used on electrical fires.
Metal casting is fun, and can be accomplished without accidents if
you are diligent about your techniques. It is a skill that will be
most useful if and when the SHTF. I just read C.W. Ammen's "The
Complete Handbook of Sand Casting" and feel that it is
a great start to making almost anything out of metal.
Be blessed! - Chris
Jim:
I drop bullets from the mould into the five gallon bucket of water
in which I have placed a mesh nylon bag. When I am through casting
I hang
up the bag of bullets to dry. I have found that lubricant will
not stay on damp bullets. Regards, - Vlad
Sir:
A link to a much safer and far superior method of manufacturing
bullets than casting hot lead is to swage bullets: http://www.corbins.com/
I have had and used professional level swaging equipment from my
first business opportunity in 1982.
While I have sold that original business many years ago I continue
to manufacture my own jacketed bullets for my favorite bench-rest
rifles and continue to enjoy a much safer and cleaner method to manufacture
bullets.
While swaging is considerably more expensive (and I continue to cast
bullets from time to time, particularly for black powder arms.) I
can say from over twenty years now that I enjoy the method and results
much more than I could ever enjoy casting hot lead.
Swaged bullets are world record breakers, almost every precision
competition rifle event is dominated by custom swaged bullets and
for good reason, the ultimate in accuracy and quality.
I have over the years collected a shop full of swage dies for rifle
and pistol and have not regretted the purchase, if anything it has
enhanced my enjoyment of the craft of reloading, knowing I am in
total control from primer choice to jacket material and bullet weight
(down to the tenth of a grain!)
I would suggest that if you are serious about swaging that you buy
one of the special designed presses (the main product form Corbin
pulls double duty as swage press and reloading press) as the pressures
involved are too much for a standard reloading press.
Imagine the potential of manufacturing jacketed bullets when you
may be the only supplier available, often using junk or scrap metals
for jackets (the ability to turn .22 LR casings into jackets for
center-fire .22 rifles).
I would not want to place the curse of the foul habit of bench-rest
shooting and reloading on any sane person, the benefits of cold lead
flow forming of lead and jacketed bullets is worth the investigation.
- Wotan
« Letter Re: Advice on Military Surplus .308 Ammo |Main| Note From #1 Son: »
Letter Re: Uses for CONEXes at a Retreat
Jim,
You mention using CONEX overseas
shipping containers
as an improvised house. I have been planning on putting two 40' containers parallel
to each other,
cut some openings between containers (to "open" up some room)
and cutting holes for windows/doors-using the cut outs as shutters
over the windows/doors. I bought "one way" containers as
they are near perfect, not 7-to-9 year olds being sold cheaper-with
holes, dents, rust and doors that won't open. Forest fire and theft were
my reasons
for using all metal outside. Do you or any of your readers have any
suggestions before I light the cutting torch to reality? [Your novel]
"Patriots" has
given me tons of ideas and encouragement that I can prepare. Thanks,
- R.E.
« Odds 'n Sods: |Main| Note From JWR: »
How to Build an Inertial Well Slow Pump for Grid Down Emergencies, by Peter Hardt
This article describes how to build an inexpensive, simple, easy
to use pump that can pump water out of a residential water well from
about
100 feet down. It’s called the “Simple Siphon” pump
because its key component is a cleverly designed valve by that same
name. (See below). Under ideal conditions it can bring up between 1/2
and 1 gallon per minute. I know this works, because I built and tested
one on my own home well. If the power goes out, this pump can get you
lifesaving water! Building the Simple Siphon™ Well Pump (SSWP)
will require the following:
1. One Simple Siphon™ valve, $12 for a
three-pack (not including shipping), available from http://www.siphonsonline.com or
write to Simple Siphon Plus, 684 South Drive, Divide Colorado 80814, simplesiphonplus@earthlink.com (Congratulations
guys for making a simple, durable, affordable valve that can be used
for a wide range of fluid-handling projects!)
2. Amazing Goop® Plumbing adhesive and sealant by Eclectic Products,
Inc.
3. One 200 foot roll of 1/2” black thin-wall drip hose (drive
around with your valve to different hardware stores until you find
one that
carries hose small enough to form a tight fit with your valve). The
brand I found was RainDrip, 1/2” (.620) Poly Hose, 200 foot coil,
part #052020, from Lowe’s Hardware. (You probably won’t
be able to get the SSWP to work much deeper than 100 feet, but the
extra hose could come in handy for other things, and it certainly is
cheap.)
4. One section of 1/2” rigid white PVC pipe, (make sure it will
fit over your thin-wall drip hose) and cut off a 2 foot section. (OPTIONAL)
5. One pop riveter (I used one made by United Shoe Machinery Corp,
but any manufacturer will do.) Compact, lightweight, simple to use.
Read the directions.
6. One box of pop rivets (you only need 4 for this project, but you
might wish you had more), 1/8” diameter pop rivets for 1/8” “work
thickness”, United Shoe Machinery Corp, stock # S-42-100
7. One small triangular file (a little wooden handle for the file is
nice, but not necessary)
8. One electric drill and 1/8” drill bit (some of you will be
prepared enough to have an old hand-held crank or push drill, in case
the power is already off).
9. One roll of commercial-grade, outdoor-rated duct tape. (You really
don’t need it to be that high quality, but you’re only
going to use a little of it with this project and if you’re in
some kind of survival or emergency situation you won’t want to
have cheap duct tape…)
Note: Read through all the instructions below before beginning this
project!
Using a small triangular file, file the grooves on the Simple Siphon™ valve
a little deeper. Angle the file so that it cuts a more barbed shape
into the valve stem. Go easy on the filing – you
want an edge, but don’t want to cut too deeply into the copper.
It will keep the hose easier to handle if you leave it coiled in its
original size coil, but work loose the end you will be attaching the
valve to about 2 feet. Do your best to not kink the hose at
any time, if possible.
Before mounting the valve, you’ll want to slide your 2 foot section
of PVC over the end of the thin-wall tubing. This will keep the working
end of the SSWP straight, so it can’t curve and get caught on
the gaps between well pipe sections.
First, bevel both ends of the rigid pipe section so there is no edge
to catch on any mineral accretions or pipe gaps. This is especially
important for the top edge of the pipe! Getting your SSWP caught going
down into the well isn’t such a problem, but getting it caught
or snagged coming back up could be a real problem!
Put a little water or dish soap on the end of the flexible hose, then
slide the rigid pipe on. There should be enough friction that you won’t
need to glue the stiffener in place, and it’s not going to fall
off! Push it up far enough to leave you with about 3” of black
thin-wall hose to mount the valve to. Once you’re through attaching
the valve you can slide the stiffener pipe back down as close to the
valve as you can get it.
Now, using a new pencil end (not the eraser end), squirt a small amount
of Amazing Goop Plumbing onto the side of the tip. Roll the tip
around inside the end of the hose to more or less evenly coat the inside.
(Epoxy turned out to be too brittle in early testing. Goop appears
to have just the right balance of adhesiveness and flexibility.)
Apply more Goop to the pencil and roll / spread it over the valve
stem, especially in the barbed grooves. You have to move quickly, because
Amazing Goop Plumbing dries fast!
Push the valve stem into the hose end as far as the valve will go.
There will be a bead of Goop at the end of the hose, which will
be no problem. Wipe it off with your finger if there’s TOO much
and it threatens to drip.
While the Goop is still uncured, drill one hole in the side of
the valve stem, close to the top. You should be able to clearly see
where the top of the valve stem is through the bulging in the hose.
Press the un-turning drill bit into the plastic to start an indentation,
then back off of the pressure and start to drill. Use light pressure
so that the drill bit does not slide out of position and across the
tubing! Be sure you’re not drilling right at the end of the stem.
Immediately put the pop rivet head into the hole and apply the rivet
with the tool. If you haven’t used a pop riveter before, practice
on a sheet of metal or a few inches of hose.
Turn the hose over and drill a hole approximately opposite the first
hole. Rivet it.
Turn the hose so that both rivets are parallel to the ground. Drill
a third hole closer to the end of the tubing and rivet it.
Turn the hose over and drill the fourth hole approximately opposite
the last hole. Rivet it.
Wipe off any excess Goop, or Goop that may have gotten onto
the hose elsewhere. Any Goop you may have gotten on your fingers
will just roll up, and you can then wash up with soap and water. (If
you’re concerned about getting Goop on your hands, wear
vinyl or rubber gloves.)
The Simple Siphon Well Pump assembly will dry more quickly if
it’s kept warm indoors (the smell is not strong). 24 hours is
the minimum. The Goop’s main job is to seal any leaks that might
form between the hose and the valve stem, but it’s also going
to help hold the valve to the entire end of the hose, while the rivets
only hold the valve to the hose at four points. (This assembly – with
no glue - has been actually tested to hold at least 53 pounds of weight,
in a bucket hanging from the valve. In further testing the rivets tore
through the tubing around a load of 100 pounds or so. This is plenty
of strength for the water above the valve and any peak load caused
by pumping the hose up and down.)
After a few hours of drying, when the Goop isn’t tacky anymore,
re-coil the tubing into a larger circle. My tubing originally came
in a coil that was 18 inches across. The hose will have less resistance
to moving up and down in the well pipe if it’s not coiled so
tightly. I re-coiled my tubing around the back of a recliner, for a
diameter of about 25 – 26 inches. If you’re going to be
handling your Simple Siphon Well Pump in cold weather, you might
want to coil it even larger.
To make handling the hose inside the cramped quarters of a well-house
/ pump house easier, duct tape the end (not the valve end) to the hose
when you make your FIRST loop of hose. This will keep the end from
whipping around, and keep it clean if you cover the hose tip too. Every
5 or so loops, duct tape the coils together (one layer will do), then
keep coiling. As you insert the tubing, tear off the duct tape as you
come to it. Reverse this process when you take the tubing back out
of the well when you’re done.
To protect the valve head from damage from getting flung around in
tight quarters with metal pipes and fixtures (the pump house), I’m
outfitting my pump valve end with a bit of foam rubber-type material
to cushion it, and will remove the tip cover when I’m ready to
insert the SSWP.
NOTE: If you’re building your Simple Siphon Well Pump
in advance of a regional or national electrical emergency, you might
consider preparing at least one of your spare Simple Siphon valves
in advance. Since drilling through the copper valve stem is the one
step that involves an electrical tool (drill), you could pre-drill
(and pre-file, might as well) one of your spare valves in the appropriate
places. Save the spare to replace your main valve if it gets damage,
if you need to build a second pump, or if your original hose gets damaged
and you need to shorten it (removing a valve once riveted on is hard
work unless you have an electric drill handy).
Once your spare valve was slid into a tight-fitting hose end, you should
be able to gently probe the plastic to locate where the holes are and
manually drill through the hose with an awl, or small and sharp Phillip’s
screwdriver head, or with a manual drill (crank, or Yankee screwdriver-style
push drill), then rivet it in place.To use your SSWP you’ll need:
1. The SSWP
2. Two pipe wrenches (at least 14” long, probably no shorter
than that, wrenches that are much longer than that may be hard to use
in a cramped pump house)
3. 2 clean rags or washcloths – one dry, one soaking wet
4. Roll of duct tape (of course!)
5. One contractor-grade 30-gallon trash bag
6. One or two 5-gallon water bottles (When transporting water remember
this: it weighs 8 pounds per gallon. Each of these bottles will weigh
40 pounds. It’s probably easier to move heavy weights like these
two at a time.)
7. Two feet or so of the thin-wall tubing, cut off and carefully split
lengthwise
8. Teflon thread tape for plumbing
9. A 3/4” x 1” female plumbing adapter (50 cents or so,
threaded for 1" O.D. pipe on one end, with a 1" inner diameter
un-threaded end on the other) will cover the threads on the well pipe
so they don't
cut into the SSWP piping.
Take two pipe wrenches out to your wellhead and remove the well pipe
cap. One wrench holds the well pipe from turning, and the other, facing
the opposite direction, turns the well cap. Get help if you don’t
understand how pipe wrenches work. (If you’re testing this before
the power actually goes out, you must first shut off the well pump
switch and drain the water from the pressure tank. In fact, even after
a power failure, to be on the safe side, check that there is no water
pressure in the pressure tank.)
Use one clean rag to thoroughly dry around the top of the well pipe,
inside and out.
Tear off a 4 inch piece of duct tape and wrap it around the well pipe,
with half of the duct tape above the end of the pipe. Roll the half
sticking out over the top edge and into the pipe end. If you can still
feel sharp edges through the duct tape, add another layer. Run another
section of duct tape around that tape to firmly attach it to the outside
of the well pipe. You’re creating a slight cushion at the top
of the pipe to protect the SSWP from being scratched or rubbed through
when inserting the SSWP or when pushing it up and down. (A hardware
store may have something more durable you could adapt to protect the
SSWP, just be sure the SSWP will pass easily through its opening, and
securely tape your guard to the well pipe to keep it from moving around.)
As you lower the SSWP into the top of the well, use the damp cloth
to wipe down the hose as you insert it. Ideally, you could mix a little
(a l-i-t-t-l-e !) bleach in the water that you soak the cloth in, to
help clean and sterilize the hose as it goes in. Too much bleach will
be hard on your hands.
Don’t insert the SSWP too rapidly unless you know the depth of
the pump. You don’t want to ram the valve into the top of the
pump at the bottom. Slow down as you approach the bottom.
You don’t absolutely need to reach the very bottom of the well
pipe. All you need to do is to get the Simple Siphon™ valve several
feet (say 6 feet) below the static water level inside the well. The
one unknown is how fast water will seep into the well pipe through
your model of electric well pump. The deeper you can empty the well
pipe with your SSWP, the more water pressure will be exerted at the
pump to refill the pipe, and it will refill quicker.
So if you’re pumping the well pipe dry, try pumping at a lower
depth. If you’re still pumping it dry at the bottom of the well,
you’re just going to have to pump more slowly. Leave the SSWP
at least 6 feet above the well pump to give it room to refill (water
will seep around the SSWP and up the well pipe, but it will not seep
into the end of the SSWP because of the pressure of the water stacked
above the Simple Siphon valve, that’s why you have to
shove it up and down to create a sucking/pumping action).
Once inserted, if you’re really at the bottom of the well, and
you’ve got a lot of extra hose left, cut the hose so there’s
enough length to reach your water container and a generous loop as
well. Take the remaining part of the hose and have your assistant hold
it in your water jug. If you don’t have an assistant, duct tape
the hose so it won’t pull out of the opening of the jug.
Do your best to not kink the hose at any time! Once you’ve determined
the best working depth for the SSWP, take the split section of hose
you prepared earlier and tape it to the SSWP hose so that one end is
just inside the well pipe and the other end is where your upper hand
will hold the hose. Don’t duct tape the part that is going to
be going in and out of the well pipe unless you’re sure the extra
thickness won’t be too much for the well pipe. You are reinforcing
the “working” part of the SSWP so that it can take the
motion of pumping without kinking. If the hose kinks it will continue
to fold at that point each time you move the hose, and you’ll
have to hold the hose there or otherwise support it.
If you need more hose, you could splice on a short section of hose
from another roll, using a double-ended barbed plastic coupler (ideally
glued or clamped into place). But don’t use spliced hose in the
well pipe unless you’re absolutely desperate, because of the
possibility that it could come apart at the splice (long hose stuck
inside the well…). You can buy a $15 crimping tool by Murray
Keystone ("045, OTC-1000 Tool Crimping", looks like a nipper,
but with no sharp edge) and some 3/4" Ideal Crimp Clamps (high-nickel
corrosion resistant, my package said 3/4” but it actually fit
pretty well over the 1/2” hose. These crimp clamps – use
two per side of the connection – work pretty well, but they stick
out from the side of the hose too far to risk putting
them inside the well
pipe. They’ll be fine for an extension between the SSWP and your
storage jugs. If you absolutely must use a spliced hose in the well
pipe, pin the connector to the two pipe ends with long pop rivets or
nails, passed through drilled holes, instead of using a crimper or
clamp.)
Once everything is in place, lift the Simple Siphon valve well
away from the well pump at the bottom so you don’t smash into
it (this is important!). (Remember, the SSWP only needs to be below
the static level of the water, not all the way at the bottom of the
well…) Quickly build speed going up, then quickly shove the SSWP
down into the well pipe about 9 to 12 inches. Draw it back up, then,
quickly reversing direction, shove it down again. What causes the suction
and pumping action is that the water in the hose gets moving in one
direction (up) until it’s moving quickly, and when the hose reverses
direction and starts suddenly downward, the water in the hose continues
upward from inertia. This creates suction in the valve end of the hose!
Water gets sucked in, and the valve keeps it from running back out.
(This inertia-caused pumping is the principle behind the SSWP, in fact
we first considered calling it the “L.I.F.E. Well Pump,” standing
for Lightweight, Inertial-Flow-Effect
Well Pump)
Each time the water level in the SSWP will rise about 6 - 9 inches,
because of suction caused by the inertia of the water. If the water
level is 50 feet underground, this means working the pump up and down
100 times before water reaches the surface – be patient! Eventually,
the water will reach the top of the well and come spilling down the
hose into the water jug. Repeat for as long as you need, trading off
if the operator gets tired. Depending on the well refill rate, you
may have to pump for a minute, then wait for 5 minutes or more while
the well refills, then pump again. It will be different for every situation.
I strongly recommend that you not leave the SSWP in the well pipe when
not in use. For one thing, someone could come along and steal it or
damage it, and you are already in a desperate survival or emergency
situation. For another, pulling it up gives you a chance to inspect
how the valve end is doing and if any holes are being worn in the tubing
somewhere along the length of the well pipe. (If you need to remove
the Simple Siphon™ valve to move it higher on the tube, or to
move it to a new tube, you can drill out the pop rivets if you’re
careful, and reuse it!)
When you pull the SSWP out of the well, have your assistant duct tape
the first coil of hose as you did when preparing the pump for use.
Then as you feed hose to your assistant, have him / her duct tape the
coils together every 5 or so loops to keep it under control, and prevent
it from kinking. Once the SSWP is completely out of the well and taped
off, store it in your construction-grade trash bag. The tube will still
have some water in it that you can collect in the bag.
Lightly replace the well pipe cap so that no dirt or insects get into
the well. Be sure to tighten the cap (using plumber’s Teflon
thread tape, or “plumber’s goop” sealant) before
you try to operate the well pump once electricity has been restored!
It would be a good idea to leave the pump shut off, in case power comes
on unexpectedly and the well cap isn’t on tightly yet…
Once you’re back at home, you can completely drain the tubing
of water to get as much out of it as possible. (None of the components
are prone to corrosion, so that’s not an issue.) Be sure to check
it for damage and repair or replace what has been damaged. A tiny hole
in the tube towards the top will only drain off a small amount of water,
but a hole nearer the bottom will drain more water because of the greater
water pressure there, and will eventually risk the structural integrity
of the SSWP.
If you aren’t sure what the quality of the water in wells in
your area is, if there is any possibility they are contaminated with
bacteria, fungus, or parasites, then please treat the water you retrieve
from the well with regular, un-perfumed laundry bleach in the recommended
proportions (or use some similar purifying technology). In a crisis,
the last thing you need is to come down with some condition or sickness
because the water was contaminated.
If you test the SSWP in a functioning well, it would be a good idea
to run a cup or two of the bleach described above through the well
cap vent hole into the well shaft when you’re finished with your
test to kill any bacteria you may have introduced to the system. And
it should go without saying that you should NOT use the same SSWP to
pump gasoline or contaminated water, as you would to pump from a well.
On a personal note:
The knowledge you now possess on how to get water out of a private
well when there is no electrical power could be life-saving power.
Before the next major crisis strikes, share this article and concept
far and wide. Many people will just dismiss you as a “survivalist
nut,” but others will understand and prepare.
Water is a unique resource. You can’t make it from something
else. If you find water you can purify it, filter it, sterilize it,
store it. But you need to have water, even lousy water, as a starting
point. Many locales will have surface water that can be made drinkable.
But some locations rely heavily on water wells and have little, if
any, surface water. The knowledge in this article will make life-giving
water easily available to people in any of those circumstances. (Getting
water out of municipal or corporate wells is a slightly different challenge.)
Share the knowledge. Make a difference. The more people who are prepared,
the better off we ALL will be.
Other valuable survival resources can be found at:
www.ready.gov
www.redcross.org
Rand
Organization Quick Guide
Crofsblogs
- Coming Pandemic
Campus
Crusade (the
ultimate “preparation” -
spiritual!)
Note! If you have the money and would like to buy a commercially made
inertial well pump, check out Waterra.com.
Also, well “bailers” have been around for a long time in
the well drilling trade. They’re long, narrow tubes with a simple
ball valve at the bottom. You lower them into your well (small ones – typically
3/4” diameter – can
fit right into the well pipe by only removing the pipe cap with a pipe
wrench and not the whole well cap!) with a cord or twine and pull them
up to empty them. It’s slow going, but VERY simple and VERY reliable.
Here are some suppliers: Vosstech, Environmental-expert.com,
and Waterra.com Buy
a pack of them and share with your neighbors!
This information is copyrighted for the purposes of making it freely
available to the public. No one else can copyright or control this
information, except perhaps to charge for the cost of simply photocopying
this article. It can be reproduced or transmitted in any form, so
long as the entire text is included. No promotional support
has been received
from any company for endorsing any product. This article exists because
this approach works, and could make a very large difference in how
well families across the United States cope with a long-term disaster.
May God have mercy on us all. - Peter Hardt
« Odds 'n Sods: |Main| Letter Re: Alternate Short Term Sources for Drinking Water »
Letter Re: Barns, Barn Designs, and Fire
Hello
James,
I have had the heart rending experience of watching my neighbor's barn burn
to the ground a few days ago. His livestock fleeing out of it, in desperation...
I don't think they all made it. This brings up many topics of discussion. In
moving to the country, it is easy to use an old building like it was designed
to handle new demands, (i.e.- specifically power consumption, hot temp equipment
storage, etc...). Somewhere in your archives the topic of fire protection came
to mind. I hate to admit, but it did not sink in like it did seeing that massive
structure go from first sight of smoke to flattened, in 20 minutes.
Here are a few observations that may have contributed to this fire-
1). Old building construction methods ("balloon" type framing.)
2). Old wood will never be fireproof
3). 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s wiring is not likely to be safe to use in an
agricultural building where the wires are almost always exposed to rodents
and the elements, resulting
in damage. [JWR Adds: Any such wiring should be
completely replaced with modern wiring that is fully encased in galvanized
steel conduit!]
4). Concrete and heat do not mix
5). Leave a viable escape route for the livestock, (i.e.-light duty tube gates,
light duty flat channel gates, or just electric fence strands in aisleways.)
6). Storing wet/damp hay
7). Overloading electrical wiring/circuitry
If you own an older agricultural building and plan on needing
it because that new "Morton" building is too expensive,
than plan on some time consuming preventatives. Fire stops, (i.e.-
draft
stops) are the most important contribution you can make yourself with
little
expense. Take the time and plug every dang gap,crack,void, or cavity
that permits you to view or pass air between the levels. This at the
very least will buy you more time until the fire department arrives.
You will be better off to condemn the power service to the barn than to overload
it and have a catastrophe.
Once a structure has a fire, the foundation and associated concrete items are
severely structurally damaged. Try tossing a cement masons block into a fire
and leave there until the next day, give it a tap with a bat, and then [for
comparison] tap an unfired block. The fired block is not worthy of the
structural demands
it
was
designed
to meet any longer. In the case of my neighbors barn fire, the adjoining buildings
suffered damage that we can't see simply from the heat. The grain silos, (concrete
and steel) ignited their contents from heat alone. These are still burning
and are now a 7 story disaster waiting to happen. I have seen it happen before.
They will collapse without warning.
Wet/damp hay WILL combust and cause many barn fires. DO NOT BALE WET OR HAY
THAT IS DAMP WITH DEW! Save yourself some money and hire it done by an expert.
One last topic worth discussing is where should you put your Gun Safe. If your
safe is situated over a basement, crawl space, or basically any wood structure
below, you are asking for trouble. If/when you have a fire in the building
that houses the Gun Safe, and it collapses upon itself, you literally have
less than an hour to retrieve your safe before the contents are toast. Think
about locating your safe on a north wall, (winds in much of the U.S.A. are
predominantly from the
N.-N.W.) This could give you the ability to get closer to the safe with some
piece of equipment (in the event of a fire) and increase your chances of retrieving
it. Consider welding a heavy chain to the safe and hiding [the tail end of
it out the building, an slightly bury it [and "flag" the end, somehow.] A backhoe
could
easily
reach the chain and hook it with it's teeth to rip the safe from the hot coals.
Do not store ANY ammunition inside your vault. Once the internal temps get
so
far, the ammunition will start
cooking off. In doing so, it will likely ruin all the contents of your safe.
At least there is a chance of salvation if there is not any ammo in the safe.
I pray for those who have experienced a fire. There are
very few forces like it in nature. It was a very helpless feeling.
Plan,
Prepare, Do not despair,
-The Wanderer
JWR Replies: For any of you
that might ever build a farm from scratch, even if you build a steel
barn there is always a greater risk of barn fires than house fires.
Therefore, it is important that, terrain permitting, you: a.) build
your barn at least 50 feet away from your house, b.) Make
sure
that
your
house has a fire-proof roof, c.) Install a proper
fire fighting hose rig with at least a 2,000 gallon cistern feeding
a 1.5-inch or larger service line, preferably gravity-fed, and d.) Build
your house upwind from your barn. (BTW, the latter is
an advantage vis-a-vis barn
smells, too.)
« Letter Re: Defensive Shotguns on a Budget |Main| Jim's Quote of the Day: »
Letter Re: David in Israel on Fire Starting
Mr. Rawles:
David from Israel wrote in with some interesting suggestions on fire
starting. The method that I use in severe weather conditions is to first
dig a small
hole,
about 6 inches in diameter and about 8 inches deep. Facing into the wind,
I dig a small channel into the side of the hole, about 2 or 3 inches wide and
sloping up
from the bottom of the small hole, about 6 inches long. Then I put tinder
in the pit and arrange short twigs around the tinder so that the twigs look like
a teepee. To make tinder you can use cotton balls
dipped
in paraffin wax, or take a small block of resinous wood such as yellow pine
and cut slivers and shavings off of it, then cut the block making slivers
still attached to the block. You can also use straw or dry grass for tinder
- if
the grass on top is wet usually you can find dry grass below. I cover the
circular hole with twigs and tinder, leaving the channel open, and then put
small (1
inch diameter) sticks on top arranged ends inward, in a circle. If the wind
is blowing hard, it's a good idea to make a windbreak so that the hole does not
have wind blowing directly
into it. Sticks, grass, and rocks make a good windbreak - place it about
a foot away from the hole. Now take a match and strike it in the channel and
put
the flame on the tinder, or
take a piece of flint and rub it against a piece of steel to produce sparks
and
make sure they land on the tinder. You'll see the tinder catch, and then
blow carefully on the tinder so as not to put it out. It takes a bit of practice,
so try this when your life doesn't depend on it (surely people camped out
when
they were growing up and know about all this?) When you see a flame, put
sticks and dry grass in the channel, and soon you will have a good fire.
I used this method to start a fire in a blizzard where the snow was blowing
straight
across (and made a six-inch layer on my sleeping bag in the morning)
and the fire was really hot, but there was still six inches of ice around
the fire, then snow. BTW, if you want to sleep soundly in such a situation,
make sure your head is covered. - H.L.
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